Defense is for winning teams, not for us!

After the first 25 minutes of Saturday's CONCACAF Gold Cup Final an American fan would be cheering and extremely confident their team was going to be able to win. That's because the US was up 2-0 on two great goals, both set up by Freddy Adu. If you had asked an American fan if Bob Bradley would should be the coach of the national team after the first 25 minutes they would have said, "YES! He has made every move he needed to in this Gold Cup, especially starting Adu," a player who many thought was a lost cause. But then the rest of the game happened.

For the entire first half Mexico pounded the United States defense, and when it seemed like they were about to break, they would always come up with a stop. However, in the 29th minute Barrera scored the first of Mexico's four goals after a gorgeous long pass and a horrendous breakdown by the American defense. Defenseman Johnathan Bornstein, who entered the game in the 12th minute after an injury to Steve Cherundolo, was burned, something that became a trend as the game continued. After the goal the mostly (by some accounts up to 90%) Mexican supporting crowd came back to life. As the half continued it became clear that Mexico was the better team, they held the ball at their feet for 59% of the half and after a few attempts from within five feet they finally put away the game tying goal in the 36th minute. As the teams went into the tunnel at the half the score remained tied, but Mexico clearly had all of the momentum. 

The second half started out poorly for the U.S. Once again they played little to no defense near the box allowing Mexico to control the ball at the top and get a quick pass to Barrera who quickly put his second goal past Tim Howard in the 50th minute. It was after Mexico's comeback was complete that the U.S. finally started to play well, they began to hold the ball at their feet, passed well and kept the ball in their third. They had numerous chances to score the tying goal: captain Carlos Bocanegra came close with a header off a corner, Freddy Adu came closer on a free kick from 25 yards and Clint Dempsey came closest when he smashed a sure goal off the crossbar. But just like U.S. soccer as a whole they were not quite elite enough to go in. 

The low point in the game came in the 76th minute when Giovani dos Santos collected a pass from his teammate in the box (a pass that was set up by a terrible clearing attempt by Bocanegra). Howard charged dos Santos and attempted to go for the ball, but dos Santos had other ideas, eluding the swiping arms of Howard multiple times with fantastic footwork before chipping a perfect ball just over the top of Bocanegra's head sealing the game for Mexico. 

The final goal showed why Mexico deserved to win the game: they were better. 

Their footwork was better, their passing was better, their shots were better and most importantly their defense was better. It is something that is said in EVERY sport: defense wins championships, and Mexico proved that on Saturday. Mexico carved up the American team like a thanksgiving day turkey and they did so with reckless abandon. I don't know for sure, but I am confident that the Mexican team never thought they were going to lose, they certainly didn't look like they thought that. The same cannot be said for the US because even with a 2-0 lead the American defense didn't appear to think IT could win. They were constantly being burned by Mexican strikers, and they were almost always in full sprint toward their own goal, which as the announcers last night said is, "never a good thing." 

If there is one thing that the US learned from last night's game it's defense is for winners and right now the US National Soccer team are a bunch of losers.