SOCCER / JULIE CART : Brose’s, Reyna’s Memories of ’92 Benefit U.S. in Upset of Norway
They hadn’t been on the same field since the 1992 Olympic Games. Neither had ever played with the U.S. senior national soccer team. So, late in Saturday’s 2-1 victory over Norway, Dario Brose and Claudio Reyna relied on distant memories to form a play that set up the winning goal.
“No one here knows I can throw the ball as long as I can,” Borse said of his ability to kick long passes. “But Claudio knows, from the Olympic team. I told him, ‘If I get the ball, take off.’ ”
Reyna saw his chance, when Brose launched a long pass. “I looked at him and started running,” Reyna said.
Reyna took the pass just outside Norway’s box and sent a hard shot at the goalkeeper. The rebound kicked out to Cobi Jones, who scored.
It was a fitting debut for Reyna, a junior at Virginia, who has won every award college soccer has to offer. The national team has awaited the end of the collegiate season so Reyna could join camp.
“I’m just happy to be here and I hope I can contribute,” the soft-spoken Reyna said. “I’m only 20. I’m not concerned that it will be my last World Cup chance. I’m going to do my best and see what happens.”
Reyna is a highly skilled playmaker in the midfield. So is Brose, who has been playing in France for second division St. Brieuc. Brose is on break from his club team and is expected to play against Switzerland Saturday at noon at Cal State Fullerton.
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The night before the Norway match, a committee of four U.S. players called a meeting. The topic: attitude.
“We all sat down for 45 minutes or an hour,” Marcelo Balboa said. “Last year, we didn’t have a winning attitude. We said, ‘Let’s give ourselves a chance to win the game.’ You need to air things out, to get past the bickering and problems. We wanted to start the new year with a new attitude.”
Such players-only meetings are often seen as a healthy means of catharsis by coaches. In soccer, where coaches are restricted to a distant sideline and are unable to call timeouts to confer with players, a team is left to its own devices and leadership. Chemistry and communication are crucial.
When losing, it is natural for players to blame others, and when a team is consistently making the same mistakes, frustration escalates the finger-pointing.
For the U.S. soccer team, the last three years have been a numbing grind of correcting faults. With a sparse schedule and few opponents, their frustrations have been internalized. In football, coaches take it as a sign of readiness when fights break out in practice. Infighting is not so constructive in soccer.
Perhaps with the World Cup now only five months away, the team is beginning to rechannel its energy.
“I saw a marked change in the guys at the draw,” U.S. team general manager Bill Nuttall said. “It all hit them in the face. This is it. They went home and reflected on that.”
After three years of training and playing matches whose meaning pales in comparison to the World Cup, the U.S. players may be invigorated by the prospect that, after all the tedious preparation, the real games are about to begin.
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Twenty-three World Cup teams notified FIFA Saturday of their choices of training sites for the June 17-July 17 tournament. The U.S. team has already made known its intention to remain at its existing training center in Mission Viejo.
Four teams will use training facilities in Southern California, two from Group A--Colombia and Romania--and two from Group B--Cameroon and Sweden. These four teams will each play at least one game at the Rose Bowl.
The four training sites are at UC Irvine, Cal State Fullerton, Loyola Marymount and at Oxnard. The sites were selected through a bidding process managed by venue executive director David Simmons and his staff. Each of the sites has, in addition to all facilities required by FIFA, Bermuda tiff grass, which is similar to the field at the Rose Bowl.
After the final draw in Las Vegas last month, the qualified teams dispatched representatives to their venue cities and toured training sites and hotels. Different teams have different priorities--the Italians made it known they wanted total isolation and have secured an entire resort hotel on the Hudson River north of New York City. Brazil, too, declared an interest in being shielded from its prying media and fans.
The selections are expected to be announced before the end of the month.
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Soccer Notes
U.S. soccer officials had a fright last week, when news reached them that Roy Wegerle, a forward with Coventry City in England, had injured his knee. Tests revealed a strain in the medial collateral ligament to Wegerle’s left knee. National team trainer Rudy Rudawsky said Wegerle was expected to resume light training in 10 days. Wegerle remains in England. . . . Also in England: Kasey Keller continues to impress as Millwall’s starting goalkeeper. Millwall is in fourth place in the first division and has a chance for promotion to the Premier League next season. Timo Liekoski, a U.S. assistant coach, scouted Keller in the recent match against Arsenal in the third round of the FA Cup. Keller, on his way to his fifth consecutive home shutout, gave up a goal in the final minute of a 1-0 loss. There is still no clear indication from U.S. Coach Bora Milutinovic about the goalkeeping situation. The two goalies in camp are performing well: Tony Meola was 7-7-3 last season and Brad Friedel was 3-6-7. However, Meola gave up 24 goals while Friedel gave up only 18. Meola made a brilliant save late in the game against Norway last Saturday, while Friedel played well against Germany last month, a performance that brought interest from at least one German club.
Milutinovic has all but ruled out the possibility that Steve Snow would get a tryout with the team. Snow, a proven scorer who some believe is not fully recovered from knee surgery, had been playing in Belgium, but has returned to the United States to play indoors. Milutinovic is often reluctant to publicly assess players, but said last week he saw no point to bringing Snow to camp. . . . Coach Egil Olsen of Norway, asked if he agreed that his team’s World Cup group--Italy, Mexico and Ireland--was properly called the Group of Death: “I agree on that. When we saw that group being formed I said, ‘I hope we don’t get into that group.’ But it will be the same situation as we had in qualifying, being drawn with England, Holland and Poland. We must hope to finish second.”
