Men’s Olympic Team loses, Olympic soccer goes bonkers, and more: Thursday Freedom Kicks
Happy Thursday, everyone. The Olympics are in full effect, at least on the soccer side. We begin with all the men’s action from yesterday before the women take the field today.
The U.S. men actually had their chances. They just couldn’t capitalize on them, and France had an 8-minute stretch where the score went from 0-0 to 2-0 France. They tacked on one more and that was it.
‘Unbelievable’ Argentina-Morocco Olympic opener sets extremely high bar for chaos (Pro Soccer Wire)
This was quite possibly one of the wildest endings in the history of the sport of soccer! Straight madness on the first day and first game of the tournament!!
How to watch Washington Spirit players in the 2024 Paris Olympics (DP)
The women hit the field today, and Annie has your guide ready for all the Spirit players that are representing in the Olympics.
MLS All-Stars fall to LIGA MX All-Stars in Columbus (MLS)
The MLS All-Star Game was last night, and MLS fell to the Liga MX All-Stars 4-1. Both Aaron Herrera and Christian Benteke were subs, Herrera entering in the first half and Benteke starting the second half.
In Mexico, the Concacaf U-20 Championship has had a huge change, as the matches in Celaya (including the USMNT U-20s) have been moved to Leon and Irapuato for safety reasons.
Real Madrid first club in world to report €1bn in revenue (ESPN)
1. BILLION. EUROS. That’s a lot of Hala Madrids!!
Premier League, EFL, FA, and WSL introduce code of conduct for gambling sponsorships (The Athletic)
England has imposed new rules on how teams can utilize gambling sponsorships in an effort to not target children. Seems fair to me.
Have a good one!
A few thoughts on USA vs France on the men’s side:
I think Mitrovic, the US coach, got the better of Henry, the French coach, despite the score. But they won 3-0, I hear you, but those first two individual goals that France scored without much build up or chemistry were scored by a) a grizzled veteran of the top five leagues who used to start for Arsenal and b) a rising world class player scoring a worldie. The third was basically just cuz the game was stretched. The US, I felt, had the better team ethic and approach, and made a very talented France side look rather average for quite a bit of the game. This is not due to the American spirit or whatever, this disparate group was well coached, despite a dearth of true attacking talent. Bear in mind the players the US COULD have had in this age group, and the overwhelming depth of player that France has at its disposal.
If you’re hoping for Paxten Aaronson to score more than Olise, you’re in dangerous waters, so I think the US did well. Parades was a good two way player, Yow finished incredibly well despite being just a bit eager to show for a long pass for the offside. Tolkin continues to be loathsome, as he missed the easiest far post headed chance I’ve ever seen that would have made Kevin an assist getter. Paxten is damn good. Busio I believe will be depth for the US full team. Harriel, the right back, was also impressive.
Need to get points to get out of the group, they should be relatively fine
I concur. I had very little sour taste in my mouth after that and encourage my golf club (men’s league) to watch the later reply after our men’s league night. They all appreciated the US performance, which is meaningful as most are just casually interested….
The US coaching seemed to have them well prepared. The Yanks were 2 inches from terrifying them and their raucous home crowd. The 3-0 scoreline does not represent the overall game, not at all.
I like our chances in the upcoming challenges.
Tolkin, a distant cousin of a certain famous author, seems obsessed with Legolas. He should learn to shoot like the Elven Prince and not miss, or change his hair color back to something more pedestrian.
Compared to Paredes, Yow had little impact in his stint as a sub. But he took his chance quite well. He skillfully brought down a long diagonal cross and beat the goalkeeper from a tight angle. Except it was called back. It was already well into stoppage time and the US trailed by 3 goals but the score could have been useful if goal differential plays a part in making it into the quarterfinals.
Paredes played into the 76 minute and was part of – I think – the 3 player substitution that brought Yow onto the field. Kevin was active through out and made important defensive and offensive contributions on the flank.
I watched the end of Morocco v Argentina and it was indeed crazy. The announcers on Telemundo thought the game was completely over and had ended in a 2-2 tie when they went they ended their coverage. Not til a few hours later when I was surfing the internets did I see a headline that Morocco had belatedly won – and there were several articles from various international news sources with headlines saying the game had ended in a 2-2 draw.
I haven’t seen an explanation of the offsides call. On what was believed to be the game tying 2-2 goal, the keeper was on his line and a Moroccan defender was inside the goal backed up against the net. So I believe that on the final shot there could have not been an offsides situation. But maybe the offside was somewhere earlier in the buildup during the crazy scramble that saw 2 shots come back off the crossbar.
I wouldn’t mind seeing a detailed explanation of why the goal was called back an hour or two after most people thought the game had ended in a draw.
As for today, Vamos Mujeres!
As for the Argentina/Morocco game, while I did not see it happen myself, my understanding of the situation was this: When the game “ended” after Argentina tied the game, it had actually been suspended due to the reaction of the fans in the stadium. The players were then brought back out after the stands had been emptied, and the game resumed, which is when the goal was overturned. Had things not gotten chaotic, I presume the goal would have been called back more promptly and the game would have finished as scheduled
Part of me is glad I didn’t see this bizarre fiasco. Part me is jealous that I didn’t, because it sounds so ridiculously salacious.
There were 4 shots in succession. The offside occurred on the second shot,which was deflected by the goalie and came off the crossbar to an Argentinean player who headed a shot that also hit the crossbar, but he was barely offside (half of his foot) when the 2nd shot was taken — so it was irrelevant what happened with the defense after that first ball came off the crossbar and came back to the Argentinean who had been offside when the shot was taken.
The eventual goal-scorer was even farther offside when the second shot was taken, but was played onside by the time that third shot was taken. All irrelevant because the offside occurred the moment the other player headed the ball after being offside when the ball was last played by a teammate who blasted that shot that nearly tied it up.
US Men’s 7s rugby beat Uruguay this morning 33-12 to book a place in the Quarterfinals where they will face Australia at 4:30 EDT this afternoon. If they lose then they will play in the 5-8 placement matches while a win will see them through to the Semifinals where they would face the winner of Fiji vs Ireland.
Since Japan’s free kick goal this game has been all Spain. its currently 1-1 in stoppage time of the 1st half.