U-23 Olympic Warm-Up Friendly Set in China Briefing

Tommorow the US U-23 squad will take on their respective Chinese counterparts at the Changsha He Long Sports Centre in the first of a two-set of friendly matches for Peter Nowak’s young boys. This will be Nowak’s debut at the helm for the eventual Olympic squad and he will use these two games to sort through the plethora of young MLS talents who stepped up this past season.

One of those guys that really started showing his quality for not only his club (Chivas USA) but also in his few caps for the full team, was Sacha Kljestan, who was named captain of this U-23 squad by Peter Nowak. Sacha is undoubtedly the biggest “dude” on the team, and for that reason alone he deserves to be named captain. His skills are pretty nice too, bro. Seriously though, this is one of those fringe guys that if he keeps impressing he may be able to sneak into the 2010 squad, keep an eye on his continuing development.

One hopeful youngster that was a standout on the U-20 level this past summer, Sal Zizzo, suffered a high ankle sprain in Tuesday’s training session and his availability for these games is in doubt. It would have been good to get another look at this kid on a level Nowak could really test him at. At Hannover he is glued to the bench because of his youth and inexperience at the pro-level, understandable. The U-23 platform would provide the chance for Zizzo to prove to people that his U-20 performance showed his true colors and that he can do it at the next notch up. He will still be a big option for when the actual Olympics roll around, so I still see him having an impact with this squad. It just probably won’t be this weekend. Sorry Sal, you can at least find happiness in the fact that you probably have the coolest name in the camp.

From what I am seeing on the US Soccer site, it doesn’t look like this one is going to be on the tube. Shame, this would be a nice way to cure the US Soccer withdrawal all fans are probably feeling at this time. Maybe an online stream will show up, not that I would ever condone using an illegal online television stream (wink*).

That’s all I got for now. Cruise on over to the official U-23 blog to check things like Sacha and Jozy twirl their noodles… Just check it; it’s not what it sounds like.