Arena Post Match Quote Bonanza

One of the best things about following the US is Bruce Arena’s post match press conference. While other managers keep their assessment of players close to their chest (I’m looking at you Sven), Arena rarely fails to share his thoughts. Hear what he has to say by listening to US Soccer’s post-match podcast or read on for quotes.

Arena on…

…who stood out:

“Good goals by Ching and Dempsey. Somme good performances across the back, I thought Conrad in particular played quite well. I was pleased with Ching’s performance tonight, Convey certainly played quite well, Tim Howard made a real big save in the second half.”

…Bobby Convey:

“The other night in particular [vs Morocco], there was no crossing on our part. For the game, we told our guys in the first half the other night we had three crosses. I think Bobby Convey probably had five or six on his own in the first half tonight. Being a left-sided player and getting behind the other team, whipping in some good crosses, I thought he also did well on the defensive end of the field and brought a lot of energy to the game … What we want to see out of Bobby is that kind of play for 90 minutes and I think he lost his concentration a little bit in the second half and I’m hopeful we can continue to move him forward, because there’s no reason to believe that he can’t challenge to be in our first eleven. If he can piece together 90 minute games that would certainly help his cause.”

…Brian Ching:

“He got a goal and did a good job working for 90 minutes. He did a good job holding the ball and drew some fouls, things our forwards haven’t been doing on a consistent basis, so it was good to see. I thought, in all honesty, the first 15 to 20 minutes of the game tonight were shaky and then, once he got into it, he played well. Once he scored the goal, he played well.”

…Eddie Johnson:

“An improved performance. He still has a way to go, you know, he’s still not a forward you can depend on yet for 90 minutes in these kind of games. He knows the areas he’s got to work on and he’s getting there, but this is the best he’s played in a while so that was good to see, and obviously good play on his part combining with Landon on the second goal to Clint.”

…Josh Wolff:

“Josh is a ‘tweener kind of forward, he’s not a back to goal forward, he’s a guy that likes to be fairly mobile and have the freedom to run where he likes to run in the attack and I think playing him underneath the front runners accompliches that a little bit. So were just mixing it a bit to see the positions on the field where he feels more comfortable and where he can help us. I thought for the most part Josh had a pretty good game.”

…Clint Dempsey:

“I won’t comment on possibly starting at this point in time, but I thought he had a good game. He’s a guy that’s in his own way creative and he takes chances and that’s good to see. He’s got to be a little bit more experienced and understand when to pick his spots on the field in terms of going after people in one v one situations but he’s a confident player on teh ball. He’s had a habit of scoring goals which is a real positive out of the midfield. I think that speaks well for him, I think he needs more experience in defending but I think he just did a lot of god things tonight. He needs to learn to play a little bit quicker but again this is a player with only about a year and hald of experience at the internationla level under his belt, so he’s a kid who I think has a good future.”

…Gregg Berhalter:

“He hasn’t played a game in two weeks. I’ll come back but you don’t want to throw him in there and cause a problem for him, he could get a muscle pull or what have you I think given a wekk of training he’ll be fine

…DaMarcus Beasley:

“When you look at DaMarcus, one of his great qualities is his quickness, his speed. But if you’re around him a lot you’ll know he’s a very competetive player, he’s a winner on the field, he’s a player that can play equally as well on both sides of the ball so he’s a pretty complete player, for a young player. He’s a guy that you can stick on the field in a variety of positions and he can be very responsible. I think he needs a little bit more time to find his game, he didn’t have a consistent run with PSV at the end of the year so he’s missed a number of games where it really would have helped him with his timing and all, and I think he’s a little bit behind, but you could see in training camp he’s getting better every day so I think by June 12th he’s going to be on top of his game.”

…choosing a starting eleven for June 12th:

“We have injuries at the moment… it’s still going to be based on players being in the right form. I think there’s a chance that we’ll make a few decision in the first eleven for the first game that will probably surprise some people. But there’s a couple of players that have played well in training, played well tonight, and I think deserve consideration in our first eleven. So we’re far from finalising our starting line-up for the opening game.”

And my personal favourite:

Q: Can you assess where the squad is now compared to at this point four years ago?

A: No, not really. It’s a futile exercise.