12.26.12
Morning Read: Friedel with Some Kind Words for Guzan
The longtime English Premier League goalkeeper knows a thing or three about lopsided defeats, but he's confident the current United States No. 2 will recover. Plus: Jozy!
BY
Noah Davis
Posted
December 26, 2012
3:09 AM
Brad Guzan suffered an 8-0 defeat his last time out, but Brad Friedel thinks he'll be okay. "He can be one of the top goalkeepers in the Premier League. He has all the attributes to be," the former Aston Villa netminder said about the current one. "The one thing he’s short on is playing games. He has to go through a lot of experiences—good times and bad times. He needs to get to the point where he develops that thick skin of leather where you don’t care what people think. He just needs to experience football at the highest level for a long period of time. Once he gets 34, 35 years under his belt, then we’re really see how good he can be."
In other news, Friedel recently signed a contract extension with Tottenham, despite losing his starting spot to Hugo Lloris.
Jozy Altidore is, for good reason, on the midseason XI for the Dutch paper De Telegraaf. Graziano Pelle and Willfried Bony are the other forwards. Altidore's teammate Adam Maher also made the list as a right-sided midfielder.
The New York Times takes a fascinating look at how Germany is using football for resurgence: "In a little more than a decade, Germany has invested nearly $1 billion in its youth programs, with academies run by professional teams and training centers overseen by the national soccer association, the Deutscher Fussball Bund, or D.F.B. The programs testify to the long-term strategic thinking and to the considerable resources that have driven Germany’s rise to renewed prominence in—and at the expense of—a struggling continent." (That is a bit much, NYT.)
Some of the biggest names in the soccer journalist universe talk authors as footballers. It's rather endearing, if you're into that sort of thing.
Ben Queenborough/isiphotos.com
