2010 SOCCER WORLD CUP QUALIFYING TEAMS:
U.S.A. -
NORTH, CENTRAL AMERICA AND CARIBBEAN GROUP
Nickname:
Stars and Stripes
FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking:
11
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CONCACAF
Group: Road to the Finals
 Qualifying
will be the same as for 2006. The first
round saw 11 preliminary matches between the
lowest ranked nations.
The rest of the nations joined qualifying in
the second round when they were seeded again
based on FIFA World Ranking. The winners of
the 12 two-legged ties will move into round
three. The next round was done on a league
basis, with three groups of four countries.
The top two teams in each group advance.
This phase was completed on November 19.
The final stage saw one, six-team group from
which the top three will qualify. The fourth
placed team earns a play-off against a
nation from South America.
 The
United States began their campaign for the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa™ in
impressive style, hammering Caribbean minnows Barbados 8-0 over two legs in the
second round of qualifying in North, Central America and the Caribbean. The
result saw them through to the first group stage in the region, where they will
be keen to finish among the top two of a section that also includes Cuba,
Trinidad and Tobago and Guatemala.
For well over a decade the United States has been standing right up to old
standard bearers Mexico for CONCACAF's top bragging rights. Although it is still
a contentious issue on both sides of the Rio Grande (the river which separates
the US from its southern neighbours), the Americans' first-place finish in
qualifying for Germany 2006 and a recent win over Mexico which brought a fourth
CONCACAF Gold Cup crown has many saying it's the USA that holds sway heading
into qualifying for South Africa 2010.
After finishing fourth at the first world finals in Uruguay in 1930, the USA
made waves by beating England in 1950 before settling into a regrettable
tradition of underachievement on the football front as other sports such as
baseball, gridiron and ice hockey took hold back home. But with a large
immigrant movement and firm ethnic strongholds, the States was still considered
something of a sleeping giant in those waning years. They awakened in 1990,
qualifying for the finals in Italy after forty years in the international
wilderness.
The Americans haven't looked back and have reached every FIFA World Cup since
with their best finish coming in 2002 in Korea/Japan where they went just a
whisker from reaching the semi-finals after beating Mexico in the round of
sixteen. A first-round exit from Germany 2006 had some wondering if the success
of 2002 was an anomaly, but 2007 brought a return to positive thinking and hope
for future glories.
The early exit from Germany was compounded by the dismissal of long-time head
coach Bruce Arena and the retirement of the influential trio of captain Claudio
Reyna, Brian McBride and Eddie Pope. The shake-up sent the Americans into a
tailspin of self-doubt that they only managed to pull out of in time to win the
June 2007 instalment of the CONCACAF Gold Cup - the region's biannual cup of
nations.
The current team is led by homegrown coach Bob Bradley, a one-time apprentice to
Arena and not exactly the world renowned name the US Soccer Federation had
promised. Despite his lack of international pedigree, the coach made a fighting
unit of his team and has taken advantage of his history in the country's youth
system to prepare a squad combining overseas stars and home-grown, up-and-comers
from Major League Soccer.
In the foreign legion are such established names as DaMarcus Beasley of Glasgow
Rangers, Feilhaber of Derby County - who was plucked from obscurity in
California and now looks like one of the team's hottest properties. Also, the
England-based goalkeeping trio of Kasey Keller (Fulham), Tim Howard (Everton)
and Marcus Hahnemann (Reading) is as strong as any team can lay claim to.
Clint Dempsey has been making his mark at Fulham alongside Keller, and teenage
sensation Freddy Adu of Benfica will also be a tempting option for Bradley. In
MLS, Landon Donovan of LA Galaxy leads the homeboys.
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