Group G Watch
Group G Players Fail to Impress with Their Clubs
In his weekly roundup of players likely to line up against the United States in the 2014 World Cup, Blake Thomsen notes that Group G players had a something of an off week.
BY
Blake Thomsen
Posted
December 25, 2013
10:30 AM
The U.S.’s Group G foes went into the winter break with a whimper, as Aron Johannsson alone scored almost as many goals in Europe this week as did players from Portugal, Ghana, and Germany combined.
Serie A
AC Milan’s Sulley Muntari (Ghana) picked up a rash red card late in a derby loss against Inter. Muntari was frustrated with Zdravko Kuzmanovic’s time wasting and shoved the Inter midfielder to the ground. It was a far less impressive late contribution than last week, in which Muntari scored the equalizer against Michael Bradley and Roma.
Bundesliga
Marco Reus (Germany) scored the opener in Borussia Dortmund’s shocking 2-1 home loss to Hertha Berlin. Reus used his pace to get behind the defense and took advantage of some questionable goalkeeping to put Dortmund ahead. The tidy left-footed finish was Reus’ 12th goal in all competitions.
Bayern Munich’s contingent of German national teamers added yet another prize to their overflowing 2013 trophy cabinet, cruising to the Club World Cup title. Several German players contributed in two easy wins over the Asian and African champions, with the red-hot Mario Gotze scoring again for Bayern. His shot (seen at the 1:10 mark below) looked to be deflected on its way into the top corner, but it was sweetly struck nonetheless.
La Liga
Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal) scored again for Real Madrid in the weekend’s 3-2 win at Valencia. It wasn’t a vintage Ronaldo goal, but the header from a set piece was customarily efficient and ruthless. His international teammates both missed out for Madrid, center back Pepe through red card suspension and left back Fabio Coentrao through injury.
Arabian Gulf League
Asamoah Gyan (Ghana) had a slightly below average game by his standards, only scoring once for Al-Ain in a 1-1 draw. The well-taken penalty was his 14th goal in 11 games as he continues to rack up the goals in the Gulf League. Astute observers will notice a change in penalty style (on this effort at least) from the 2010 World Cup. Back in South Africa, he famously crashed a potential quarterfinal-winning penalty off the crossbar.
Here, Gyan waits until the keeper commits before coolly rolling the ball to the other side of the goal. Perhaps something for Tim Howard to think about if he comes up against Gyan from the spot in the World Cup opener.
Blake Thomsen is a frequent ASN contributor. Follow him on Twitter.
