Potent Quotables
American midfielder Michael Bradley, after the USA’s 3-0 win over Egypt Sunday that, combined with Brazil’s 3-0 win over Italy, got the US through to the semifinals of the FIFA Confederations Cup:
“All the f—— experts in America, everybody who thinks they know about soccer, they can all look at the score tonight and let’s see what they have to say now. Nobody has any respect for what we do, for what goes on on the inside, so let them all talk now.”
Michael can be forgiven for venting. He scored one of the US goals (on Father’s Day, no less – second straight year he’s done that) to momentarily get the monkey off his dad’s back. No doubt he spends more time online than Bob Bradley does, and he’s been as much a lightning rod for criticism as anybody, given his lineage.
Sunday’s win and the remarkable circumstances surrounding it made for a nice story, but the whole situation is neither as sorted as Bradley fils would have you believe nor as dire as the blogosphere would have you believe.
A good effort against the world’s top national team on Wednesday and a Gold Cup title may momentarily keep the wolves at bay. But the son and his teammates will actually have to go out and do the work and not just talk about it.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:33 am
Hey Mikey,
You guys looked like crap against teams we expect by this point you could at least challenge. Yesterday was inspiring and miraculous, a day I’ll never forget. However, that doesn’t excuse all the previous performances since the TnT match.
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:35 am
So what would excuse it, exactly?
You know what they say, “You’re only as good as your match two matches ago.”
June 22nd, 2009 at 11:09 am
The performance against Egypt was amazing. Three goals from this offensively challenged group? Still, isn’t this the same team that looked confused and out of sorts against Costa Rica, Italy, and Brazil? This team does not even play to the level of its competition.
Bradley should not go because a change in management will not solve anything. A change in players though? Perhaps.
June 22nd, 2009 at 5:13 pm
I know what I’m saying. I’m saying, “Great. Now, let’s see how you do against Spain.”
June 22nd, 2009 at 6:21 pm
See if you can do better than the last 35 teams that have played them.
June 23rd, 2009 at 12:26 pm
I can understand Michael Bradley being ticked. He gets way more criticism than he deserves and little credit when he plays well. Still, Dan’s right. Let’s see how they do against Spain. Bradley and the rest of the midfield will have to play an outstanding match if we are to even stay close.
June 23rd, 2009 at 12:39 pm
“Let’s see how they do against Spain?”
He-LO? How has the rest of the frigging world done against Spain lately? What, exactly, are we expecting them to “do against Spain?”
Show up, give a good effort?
That’s what they did against Egypt, you see how much slack it has gotten them.
June 23rd, 2009 at 4:17 pm
“Show up, give a good effort.” Exactly. Like they didn’t do against Brazil.
June 23rd, 2009 at 4:19 pm
But the way people are talking, it’s like they expect something more than that, or they won’t believe that everybody shouldn’t get fired.
I mean, come ON. It’s freaking Spain. They could give a great effort and still get mauled.
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:54 pm
And, if we get mauled, Michael Bradley will have learned a valuable lesson about wearing the skin before killing the bear. The “See, we told you so” will rain down upon our land like locusts.
A mauling will also give our lads a chance to prove all those “never give up” cliches that all professional athletes allegedly live and die by. They can also prove that they can play smart – if they’re down three goals, no stupid red cards preventing any chance of a comeback.
I’m not stupid enough to demand a win, but I am stupid enough to demand they make me proud.