USMNT Win, Circadian Good

It was a good win because it broke a losing streak against South American teams that goes back six years and 12 games. Last win against a S. American team was May 2006 in Cleveland (oh, hell yeahs! woofwoofwoof!) over the same foe in Venezuela.

Actually, if you want to get technical, the United States has a very good record against Venezuela. 3 Wins, 1 Drawn and Zero in the loss column (since 1988). How do I know? I pulled all USMNT results going back to 1988. That's right, exciting Sundays here in the Brewery District. Anyhow, I stopped that year because it was getting tedious and irrelevant to last nights result to go any farther. Besides, it was the year my beloved z28 Camaro was built. The peak of '80s Camaro engineering, if I must say so. So there I stopped. Logical.

The reason I did it was because I don't like it when misinformation is distributed. And believe me when I say that there is a lot of bad info out there, particularly when the US National Team is involved. Even during last nights broadcast on ESPN 3. It's not just recent times that this has been happening either. Read Brian Glanville's The Story of the World Cup. What a funny little thing FIFA becomes when you take a longer view of it.

Marching back to last nights game....

Good and fair result for the US. I saw crisp and deliberate passing and organized counters. Which is to say, these guys have been coached up (finally, instead of a bunch of good players just kicking it around). I loved it. I'll take what I saw last night over the more talented guys playing in Europe / Central America any day (Dempsey, being one exception). The US team last night was mostly made up of MLS guys and the showed exactly what they should have. I gotta say when Wondo came on I jumped with pride... Were it not for some impressive goal keeping on the Venezuela side, it would have been a 2 or 3 goal outing.

Amazing how different things look when dudes functioning on the same circadian rhythm play together.

Here be interesting finds that I found in my USMNT findings today.

- We've never played Venezuela in Venezuela (since 1988).
- Current Crew forward Emilio Renteria subbed in last night and embarrassed himself getting a late yellow for no reason other than he can't control himself. DAMN IT RENTERIA.
- The USMNT has never lost when playing in Columbus (5 wins, 3 draws, 0 loss). Best record in the United States (over 5 games that is, Seattle has a clean record on 5 games).
- We've lost 12 times out of 18 in Miami. Remind me again why we ever play there?
- Believe it or not we've lost more in Costa Rica than Mexico over the last 25 years.
- The USA has never drawn or won in Costa Rica in 5 games.
- US not too hot outside borders actually. 47-22-65 (W,D,L) is what I have since 1988.
- Show off with your friends. Below are all the South American teams the USMNT has played since the last win. So what if we've only played one outside of the US. We're rich!

2006: USA (2:0) Venezuela
2007: USA (1:3) Paraguay
2007: Argentina (4:1) USA
2007: USA (2:4) Brazil
2008: USA (0:0) Argentina
2009: USA (0:3) Brazil
2009: USA (2:3) Brazil
2010: USA (0:2) Brazil
2011: USA (1:1) Chile
2011: USA (1:1) Argentina
2011: USA (0:1) Paraguay
2012: USA (1:0) Venezuela

We should play more in South America.