Kasey Didn’t Strike Out Against Germany

Angry United States fans looking for someone to blame for Monday night’s mediocre performance in a 2-0 loss to Germany need not point to Kasey Keller. The American goalkeeper was not at fault for either goal.

And in any case, he had warned beforehand that fans should not expect miracles.

“Obviously, there’s a bit of pressure on myself in this tournament,” he said. “Everybody on this team would like me to play as well as I did against Brazil [in the Gold Cup semifinals in Los Angeles in February] in all three games and we get through to the next round without a problem.

“I accept that. I have a lot of experience on this team, and if that means they put more pressure on me and take a little less pressure off one of the guys who doesn’t have quite as much experience, I’m more than willing to do that.

“I just hope people accept the fact that I probably won’t have three games like the Brazil game.”

Then Keller broke into a grin and continued.

“I could possibly make a mistake. I know it’s unfathomable, but it could possibly happen.”

It didn’t happen against Germany. It was the U.S. defenders who let him down, which recalled another Keller comment.

“I like the fact that at Leicester [City, his club team in England] I have three guys in front of me who are all bigger than me.”

Keller is 6 feet 2, but the trio of defenders in front of him on the U.S. team on Monday are all shorter. Thomas Dooley, the sweeper, is 6-1. Eddie Pope, who had to mark 6-3 Oliver Bierhoff, also is 6-1. David Regis is 5-11.

Height does not necessarily translate to talent, but talent plus height added up to more than the Americans could handle.

Nor does Keller put much stock in those who claim he is among the world’s top goalkeepers. He says there is really no way, in a team sport, to measure that.

“It’s not up to me to believe it or disbelieve it,” he said. “I just try to go out and play. I don’t worry too much about numbers. People are always going to think somebody’s better and somebody’s worse.

“I can’t break the world 100-meter sprint record and say, ‘Look , I’m the fastest man on the planet at this distance.’ I can’t do that. It doesn’t happen in this sport.

“So it’s all objective. Some people will say that I’m a very good goalkeeper and others will say, ‘Oh, it’s hype.’

“There’s probably only one person in sports right now who people say is the best, and that’s Michael Jordan. [In soccer] Ronaldo has his critics and someone else has his critics. That’s the nature of this game.”

While looking for scapegoats, or goats of any sort, in the aftermath of the debacle at Parc des Princes, the forecast of U.S Coach Steve Sampson comes into play. Sampson was asked a couple of days before the game what he thought Germany’s starting lineup would be. He rattled off 11 names.

As it turned out, nine of them were correct. Sampson had assumed Lothar Matthaus, 37, would play, but he didn’t, failing--so far at least--to play in his fifth World Cup and thereby tie the record held by Mexico’s Antonio “Cinco Copas” Carbajal, who played in five tournaments between 1950 and 1966.

Neither did German Coach Berti Vogts start Christian Ziege, but he did send Ziege on as a second-half substitute. Instead of that pair, Vogts started Stefan Reuter in defense and Thomas Hassler in midfield.

So Sampson pretty much knew the team that Germany was going to send out against the United States.

The problem was, he didn’t have a team of his own that could match up.