Keller Seems Caught in a Game of Follow the Bouncing Goalie
Expect the unexpected is a motto goalkeepers live by, but even by those standards Kasey Keller’s week has been bizarre.
Last Sunday, Keller was in Port of Spain, Trinidad, recording his third consecutive shutout as the United States defeated Trinidad and Tobago, 1-0, in a World Cup ’98 qualifying game.
On Monday, the 26-year-old goalkeeper flew back to England to rejoin his club team, Leicester City, in the English Premier League.
On Wednesday, Keller was in the nets as Leicester City upset England’s reigning league and cup champion, Manchester United, 2-0, to advance to the League Cup quarterfinals.
On Thursday, the Olympia, Wash., native was supposed to fly to Miami to rejoin the U.S. national team at its training camp. But he didn’t.
On Friday night, when Coach Steve Sampson’s squad arrived in Costa Rica, it was without Keller but with Juergen Sommer, who left his English team, Queens Park Rangers, to bolster the national team.
Why was Keller missing?
It was “due to an ankle injury he suffered” Wednesday, according to a U.S. Soccer spokesman.
Was it a real injury or was it politics, a club-versus-country squabble?
“No, it’s real,” a U.S. team spokesman said Friday night. “He told Steve [Sampson] he was only about 70%, and Steve said in that case he didn’t want him to come.”
Maybe.
On Saturday morning, the U.S. team trained at Ricardo Saprissa Stadium in San Jose, where it will play Costa Rica today. Noticeably working hard was backup goalkeeper and former UCLA standout Brad Friedel.
Meanwhile, more than 5,000 miles away, Leicester City was again kicking off against Manchester United, this time in a league game. The question being asked at training was: Would Keller, the keeper Leicester bought this past summer from his former team, Millwall, for more than $1 million, play or be on the bench nursing his ankle?
Sampson, who did not yet know the answer, made clear his position.
“As far as I’m concerned,” Sampson said, “Brad at 100% is better than Kasey at 70%. I have informed Kasey that if he plays against Manchester United injured, he will lose his starting position if Brad plays well against Costa Rica.”
Sampson was asked if he was expecting him to play.
“Yes, I am,” he said, tight-lipped.
“My feeling is that he was to stay there [in England] to recover and get therapy. It made no sense for him to come all the way back here to get therapy. But if he takes the risk and his manager [at Leicester] insists that Kasey play with a bruised ankle, then he risks losing his starting position, if Friedel plays well.
“It’s a very difficult position for [Keller] to be in, but he’s got to realize that I have to manage people on this side of the Atlantic as well. For Kasey to be excused to play injured wouldn’t be fair to the players here.”
In keeping with his weird week, Keller did play Saturday, holding Manchester United at bay for 75 minutes before the roof fell in and Leicester City lost, 3-1.
All of which means that the ball is now in Friedel’s hands. If he can keep the Americans’ seven-game shutout streak going in World Cup qualifying play and, at the same time, clinch a spot for the United States in the final qualifying round for France ‘98, the No. 1 position is his.
Friedel, who starred on the 1992 U.S. Olympic team in Barcelona, said Saturday that the rivalry between himself, Keller and Sommer (from Indiana University), is kept at a professional level, and that none of the three hope for the others to play poorly.
“All three goalkeepers on this national team respect one another, so we don’t really have that problem,” he said. “If you play poorly, more than likely you’re not going to play again. If you play well, more than likely you will. You can’t go into a game saying, ‘I hope I play well for myself,’ just so you can keep a spot. You want to go out and win. That’s the bottom line.”
Oddly enough, it was Keller’s performances in England’s top league that caused Sampson to select him as the United States’ starting goalkeeper in its World Cup campaign, replacing 1994 veteran Tony Meola, who has dropped from the picture, and ahead of Friedel.
During the last 18 months, Sampson alternated Keller and Friedel, and the combination was superb in helping the United States reach the semifinals of the Copa America in Uruguay and the finals of the CONCACAF Gold Cup and U.S. Cup ’96. Keller, the backup to Meola at the 1990 World Cup in Italy, was also the starter on the U.S. Olympic team at the Atlanta Games.
But in the lead-up to France ‘98, Sampson decided to have a clear-cut No. 1. It was not an easy choice to make, but Keller, from the University of Portland, secured the position with an astonishing shutout of Newcastle United right when Sampson was making his choice.
“It was a series of things,” Sampson said Saturday. “I think it was his outstanding play over the last year and a half. He did extremely well in the Gold Cup and the Copa America. His goals-against average when he plays with this team is outstanding. The convincing point was when he played so very well against Newcastle. That made it easy for me to justify to the team who the starting goalkeeper was.”
Friedel, not surprisingly, was not happy being No. 2, especially after having abandoned his own career in Europe, where he played for Galatasaray in the Turkish League, to return to the United States and play on loan for Major League Soccer’s Columbus Crew. He had hoped that by being more readily available than Keller, and being seen more often by Sampson in MLS, he would win the starting job. Instead, Keller go the nod.
There is actually little to choose between the two, and should the Americans clinch a spot in next year’s North and Central American and Caribbean region (CONCACAF) finals by winning today, Friedel is likely to remain in goal for the final two qualifying games this year--against Costa Rica at Palo Alto on Dec. 14 and against Guatemala at San Salvador, El Salvador, on Dec. 21.
World Cup ’98 Qualifying
UNITED STATES vs. COSTA RICA
* WHEN: Today
* SITE: Ricardo Saprissa Stadium, San Jose, Costa Rica
* TIME: 9 a.m. PST
* TV: Univision, 10 a.m. PST
* RECORDS: U.S. 3-0-0, Costa Rica 2-1-0
* AT STAKE: A victory by the U.S. team would clinch a berth in the regional finals.
* NEXT GAME: United States vs. Costa Rica, Stanford Stadium, Palo Alto, Dec. 14
