<div style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><a title="175478_10150115179951489_60072341488_6077255_2664452_o by thepeculiarcat, on Flickr" href="http:\/\/www.flickr.com/photos/thepeculiarcat/5436291116/"><div><figure class="image"></figure></div></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Photo by thepeculiarcat</p></div>
<p style="text-align: left">The United States lost a promising national team player today when Andy Najar officially announced he would represent Honduras in the 2011 Gold Cup and thus be eligible to play for their national team. &nbsp;Najar, the 2010 Rookie of the Year in MLS, comes from the Central American country but has lived the past few years in Alexandria as he came up through the DC United youth system and attended Edison High School.</p>
<p>Despite the hope that Najar would eventually join Bob Bradley’s team, this decision made sense on multiple levels. &nbsp;Despite living in Virginia the past four years, Najar would have had to maintain residency in the states for another few years in order to qualify as a citizen for purposes of playing for the U.S. &nbsp;The residency clock would have stopped if Najar went to play overseas which, if he builds off a stellar rookie campaign, is a distinct possibility. &nbsp;By choosing Honduras, he is eligible to not only play in the 2011 Gold Cup but can join the Honduras’ U-20 team and possibly play in the 2012 Olympics.</p>
<p>From a U.S. national team perspective, this is not a major loss in the short term. &nbsp;Najar plays on the wings in the midfield and would be behind Landon Donovan and Clint Dempsey on the depth chart. &nbsp;Maybe eventually he could move inside, but it would deprive his team of a speedy threat on the wing and he fits more of an attacking role needing space than a distributor. &nbsp;Long-term however it deprives the U.S. of a tantalizing option in the midfield. &nbsp;Najar is the type of player the U.S. currently lacks: quick, works well by creating space, and a threat to score whenever he touches the ball. &nbsp;Imagine the Russian World Cup in 2018 where a U.S. team captained by Michael Bradley has Mikkel Diskerud in the middle, creating scoring chances for Najar on the wing and Juan Agudelo up front. &nbsp;That is a pretty entertaining scenario, one that had to have U.S. fans salivating.</p>
<p>In the end, losing Andy Najar isn’t as devastating to the U.S. as losing Giuseppe Rossi, if for no other reason than Najar does not play a position of absolute need. &nbsp;But it does rob the U.S. of an intriguing option for the future and a playmaker who may one day be the kind of difference maker the Americans have sorely lacked.</p>


Andy Najar Chooses Honduras Over The U.S. - World Soccer Talk

Andy Najar Chooses Honduras Over The U.S.

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<p>Most of the headlines focus around Group G, the consensus “Group of Death” with Brazil, Portugal, Côte d’Ivoire, and North Korea, and the pairing of England and the United States in Group C.&nbsp; For Spain and manager Vicente del Bosque, privately they will be happy with their draw in Group H, the match schedule in terms of time, and the general lack of travel for their opening three games.</p>
<p>There are another six months until the World Cup to discuss Spain’s three national team opponents and their tactics and players, but a cursory assessment is appropriate at this junction.&nbsp; Switzerland won their group in UEFA qualifying, but many considered their group one of the weakest, if not the weakest, group in Europe.&nbsp; They held off Greece on the last qualifying round to win the group when they drew 0-0 at St. Jakob-Park in Basel against Israel. They have some quality players, including their scoring stalwarts Alexander Frei and Hakan Yakin, but they would not be considered to have one of the more talented squads in the World Cup Finals.</p>
<p>Honduras should send the United States national team some of their savory coffee beans for which they are known because Jonathan Bornstein’s 94th minute header to earn a draw against Costa Rica gave the invitation to Honduras to qualify automatically as the third place team in CONCACAF.&nbsp; <em>Los Catrachos</em> have a formidable strike force with the old warhorse Carlos Pavón and arguably the most talented player in the CONCACAF region in David Suazo, currently on loan at Benfica from his parent club Inter Milan.</p>
<p>Their strength lies within the central midfield with the brawn and brass of Wigan Athletic’s Hendry Thomas and Tottenham Hotspur’s Wilson Palacios.&nbsp; They continually impress in the Premier League within the engine rooms of their respective teams, and that form has carried into their play with the national team.&nbsp; Whether they can stifle Spain for a full ninety minutes is doubtful, but <em>La Furia Roja</em> should expect a bruising match with little to no space on the ball.</p>
<p>The Chilean national team is the mystery team of this group and possibly of the whole thirty-two team contingent heading to South Africa.&nbsp; They qualified with one match to spare and eventually finished second in CONMEBOL, no small achievement.&nbsp; These cumulative results in this session of qualifiers are not typical of recent Chilean sides, who have missed the last two World Cups and have not reached the semifinals of the Copa América since 1999.</p>
<p>This renaissance of Chilean football starts with manager Marcelo Bielsa and his willingness to employ the burgeoning young talent in Chile.&nbsp; Players such as Mark González, Fabián Orellana of Xerez, and Udinese’s wunderkind Alexis Sánchez have invigorated this perpetually underachieving squad.&nbsp; While Bielsa focuses on an attacking philosophy, he will need to shore up the defense, which was only sixth out of the ten teams in CONMEBOL with twenty-two goals allowed in eighteen matches.&nbsp; Out of the three teams Spain will face in Group H, Chile looks the most likely to achieve a result against Spain.</p>
<p>The schedule also favors Spain in their quest to add a World Cup trophy to their European Championships triumph.&nbsp; They have the late kickoff for all three match days, and after their opening match against Switzerland in Durban, their next two matches are within miles of each other in Johannesburg and Pretoria respectively.&nbsp; Vicente del Bosque, while never completely satisfied with himself or his team, will be somewhat content that the draw, on paper, seems to favor Spain to win their group and do that comfortably, both on and off the pitch.&nbsp; Should they reach the knockout stage, they could face the second-place team from Group G, the Group of Death, but the first step includes qualifying to that stage, and del Bosque and the team will not take that for granted.</p>


ALL POSTS TAGGED "honduras" - Page 2

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