AW v Mexico Match Thread 5pm SS1 Thurs4th

If anyone is going to the world cup, heres a banner idea for the AW's first WC game "Welcome Back* and *Here to Stay*

How about offering something more than just two pathetic lines of nothing?

I saw a win in watching the game, dont know about you though... my heart sunk when our opportunities went begging, and when we conceded that second goal (which by the way wouldve been considered a weak defensive effort even in capital 3)
AJ132010-03-06 18:04:15

How about the fact we simply don't have the ability (technical and physical) to live with better teams in international football when they lift intensity and hit the higher gear?

That's been evident against Italy, and South Africa, and now Mexico.

You honestly think we could have won the Mexico game? We had a couple of promising situations, but failed to create any genuine scoring opportuinites (not counting Fallon's disallowed goal here). They could have scored more than they did. Still, we fought hard, made things very difficult for them in the first half, and with a more experienced backline may have avoided conceding the two goals.

In fact, I would say the game perfectly encapsulated New Zealand's place in international football - we have moved forward and are far from easy-beats for the better teams, but we still have limitations that make it difficult for us to really be able to threaten them for a big upset.

Yes and Yes. The latter being what couldve given us a win, or if they took their chances maybe a 5-2 loss, or a 5-0 loss.... whatever. But I truly believe that a win or a draw was possible. If Mexico couldve scored more but didnt, then thats their fault, and thats exactly what can cost you a game. I just see every game as a result, whether it be the AWs on tele or myself on a Saturday.
AJ132010-03-06 20:22:17

When they were saying "muy largo/larga" it means too long, the pass was placed too far away. "Muy despacio" is too slow.

Who didn't believe it? Anything is possible in football thats whats great about it, but just because David beats Goliath sometimes doesn't mean I expected them to win or draw this game. The odds were not in our favor. Lets see...

Mexico
1. Mexico side thats already established base in the US and been training together coming off a 5-0 win over Bolivia only 1 week ago.
2. Mexico side was full strength minus Ochoa at GK
3. Sold out Rose Bowl containing 90,000+ Mexican Supporters
4. Ranked 15th in the World and have been playing against competitive teams in CONCACAF qualifying (USA, Honduras, El Salvador, Costa Rica, T&T).

New Zealand
1. Landed in the US last minute, had one day before the match to train together
2. Havent played together since vs Bahrain in November
3. Missing Ryan Nelsen and Ivan Vicelich, Nelsen missing is huge
4. Coombes and Smith getting first caps
5. Ranked 80th in the world, Oceania region is basically a joke for competition
6. Had me and maybe 10 other people there cheering for them. I didn't see any though.

Expecting a win or a draw under those circumstances is a little ridiculous, it was already going to be extremely difficult with all the other things stacked against us. It takes time, have some patience, and hopefully these warm up games will pay dividends in SA.

Stilll, you never know! (+ sar-car-stick emoticon)

I couldnt agree more, in fact if you couldve told me a week before the game that we would lose 2-0 with the above circumstances coming into play, i wouldve said "not bad". But when you watch the game and see the little things (and a few fundamentals) not being made the most of, you cant help but think 'what if?' or 'that shouldve been better'. Thats basically what i was saying. And we can all collectively agree that we need to improve, not that thats a bad thing. Its just how it is for us in NZ, and thats fine. It couldve been 0-0, it couldve been 0-1 or 5-0. And even given the above that you mentioned, we could've  won. Or at least scored a goal. Im not saying we shouldve, but we couldve.

However: "Jane and the Dragon" >>>>> "Dora the Explorer"

I know about the slow and fast twitch muscle but that applies to the short agility of the initial acceleration and you are right to suggest that certain player have more of one than the other. However most people and this includes the players, have a mixture of the twitch muscles, some more of one kind than the other. In any case, to support the fast twitch muscles for the short burst that last for about 4 second at a time, and in order to fire again and again after the fast twitch muscle recovers, the slow twitch muscle must be in reasonable peak condition to allow the odd quick movements.

If you increase the long endurance factor of the player, they are able to less use what fast twitch muscles that they have and produce a still very quick movement around the park as long they are constantly moving and have not walking or standing.

The slow twitch muscle is the muscle which does most of the supporting work for the fast twitch muscle and a top speed can still obtain and supported but for longer. What the fast twitch muscle does, is that players can reach top speed quicker (i.e better at acceleration). But that does not mean that other players cannot obtain the same top speed, it just means that getting there takes longer. The way to get around it, is to change the way the players run on the field and that means they have to keep the engine warm with constant movement and so they don't have a longer time to get to top speed by having a "rolling start". Learning not to rely on the usual shuttles side to side or front to back bidirectional movements that you have in training but to work at a different movement by going round in smaller circles and curves and bends and keeping the foot moving.

Not the most ideal in a game of football for some, but it means that training at different speed ranges and distance, they have to learn to change gears in slower transitional manner rather than the agility stop start manner that is the more classical thinking of speed. If you notice the better players in the top teams, they already have this in their playing style without thinking because of the style they play and not because they have more fast twitch muscles work in a unit. However then we start talking about technical ability and positioning here as a counteracting playing tactic.

Postgraduate lesson in sport science is over AllWhitebelievr2010-03-06 23:38:31

Our greatest weakness is game time. So i'm fine with the result. more games to come.

I feel you man, if Coombes made that cross into Smeltz on the money we would have been up 1-0 and the crowd would have been in shocked silence...or the corner from Bertos that wasn't put on goal...or the offside called on Rory...I agree we could have won or drew, I'm just saying its not the end of the world that we didn't, and I think a lot of the things that happened are simply a result of the things I mentioned above. Especially the lack of time playing together as a unit. A good example is the USA basketball team before they won gold again at the last Olympics, they had just started sending a bunch of NBA players like a week before the tournament and expecting to win the whole thing, but instead were getting beat by less talented teams like Puerto Rico that had already been playing together and had that chemistry going. Even in the 2nd Leg Bahrain game I remember instances where it just seemed like guys weren't on the same frequency where we could have scored goals but the ball was placed just a little too far behind or ahead, or in the air when they were expecting it on the ground...just little things that make all the difference that I think wouldn't be happening if they were all playing together all the time. All in all I wasn't ashamed at all to be wearing my jersey leaving the game and like I said several Mexicans came over and were suprised and impressed at our performance and to wish NZ "mucha suerte" in the world cup.

Our biggest advantage is that a number of our players will have training camp earlier than most teams because we play less competitive league games in the season this part of the globe. Australians will have a similar thing but most of their squad are european based. So definitely having the Nix's with 6 Aws and the NZFC finishing, we could gel as a unit and dicate the European-based players to move in sync earlier as a squad and team. For a lower ranked team and not having as much players in higher leagues, it is the next best thing is for more together time to bond.AllWhitebelievr2010-03-07 22:51:39

Bonding is one thing-- game time is the main thing

A couple of interesting results for Mexico lately, 2-1 win over North Korea, 0-0 draw with Iceland. Not looking too good?

Organisation and formation system is needed with the home based players anyway because lets face it, the games level here are not high enough. So we focus a bit on our strategy and fitness before the warm ups.

Game time for our attackers and attacking midfielders will be important because they can focus on increasing their playing speed levels. So the fact that the squad is split between either game time for our top gamebreakers or training time for the rest can corresponding to our use of ball possession and when we are not in possession of the ball that occurs in the game phases.

The training camp is for two weeks from April 28 to May 10, I think outside of that, the home-based players are doing some resting downtime and working on their personal fitness training plans then a quick time together before the Australia, Serbia, Solvania and Chile matches.

With those matches, there should be plenty of work to get consistently high performance. They would be doing 7 matches in 33 days. 4 warm up matches and 3 pool games gives them about one game every 4-5 days.

Hopefully by the 4th match, they would be physically getting use to it and ready to start the tournament running. Every day of those months are penciled and timetabled already on what they are going/planning to do. The training schedule must be already planned and organisated as to how they going to approach this in April/May/June.

From the time they qualified, the ink started to pour onto the paper.

Good to hear that the coaching staff is looking at the NZFC match between Auckland and Waitakere.

While I understand the need for game time for everyone, it is not possible of a number of players let alone whether they are getting suitable level training if they did go to some clubs. Some club training can worsen the players preparation for tournament play. No point playing at a low level or disorganised club which can make things worse. Which I believe is the case for many of these home-based players if they decided to take the short loan option instead of a little rest, light personal training and then reorganised/aligning themselves for the tournament.

I'll say that good luck to them, there is plenty to cover. I hope that the Pro-licence course and the technical advice that Rick had received will help prepare us for this tournament.