Sunday, September 6th 2009, 4:00 AM
SANDY, Utah - Tim Howard called it "a track meet," a frightening, back-and-forth relay race with three huge points and possibly a World Cup bid at stake. And then in the 87th minute, the ball somehow found itself in the wrong place, on the foot of El Salvador forward William Reyes, eight yards out.
"When he turned to shoot, I was thinking, 'He has the whole goal,'" Howard said. Reyes might have ruined everything. Instead, he spun and struck the ball just a bit to the right of Howard, who made a relatively comfortable save.
It had required a bit of good fortune, but the U.S. national team grimly held on to further its qualifying run with a scary 2-1 victory over a CONCACAF minnow. The result was helpful, but not particularly encouraging. If it weren't for Landon Donovan, the Americans might have suffered a humiliating upset.
The U.S. could not afford to lose, or draw, this home match Saturday played below the mountains at Rio Tinto Stadium. Yet they found themselves in desperate straits after yielding a sloppy goal by their relatively inexperienced back line in the 32nd minute. As usual in such circumstances, Donovan performed the rescue with two gorgeous, head-high crossing passes into the box to Clint Dempsey and Jozy Altidore, for a pair of first-half goals.
"I'm either looking for somebody who is open, or I'm just trying to put the ball in a dangerous place," Donovan said. "Tonight, I was just putting them in a dangerous place."
His instinctive playmaking took the starch, and the stalling, out of the Salvadorans, who have virtually been eliminated from the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
Unfortunately, Donovan appeared for much of the match to be the only American player capable of imaginative attack. He can be a wonder to behold in full flight, or simply changing vectors on a field. Meanwhile, his teammates failed to penetrate, or string meaningful passes together. For half an hour, the Americans mustered no more than half chances. Then, suddenly, everything changed.
Jonathan Bornstein began a parade of errors by mis-clearing a ball from the left side back into the box and directly to El Salvador forward Rodolfo Zelaya. Carlos Bocanegra backed too far off Zelaya, who centered the ball high to Christian Castillo directly in front of Howard. Castillo beat defender Jonathan Spector on the header for a goal, despite a height disadvantage.
This appeared to shock the Americans into action. They immediately committed more numbers to the attack. In the 41st minute, Donovan's free kick from 35 yards out on the right side found Dempsey's brow. A couple of peripheral Americans were in an offside position on the play, and the Salvadorans howled about it. Dempsey, however, was onside.
Source
Post a Comment
0Comments