Story on Clive in Oregon

I do hope to get down south to see Christine play in the pro league next season.

She deserves to play for a medal in the Olympics or World Cup.

Geez

You're right, of course. She has scored a lot of goals. I meant that she would have scored even more playing for the US, she would be ebtter known because the US is a stronger team (and would have been better with her).

Who knows, maybe Tiff would have gottent o play for the national team longer - she still has what it takes and they are a great combination.

Or maybe April Heinrichs would have put her at holding midfield to hammer the ball long for Abby Wham-bash. It's hard to know how (and whether) the US coaching staff would have used her.

As good as Christine is, it's sure that she would have had many fewer caps as a teenager if she had to break into the US side.

When I saw them both in person playing for their national teams last year, I watched them both closely. My impression is that Christine is a much more complete player than Abby. I think they would have made a fantastic attacking combination, although Soreknees' point about Heinrichs and the dark days of US soccer is a good one.

I'm not a big Abby Wham-bash fan. Her technical skills aren't all that great, she's not fast, and her specialty seems to be falling down and taking penalty kicks. If one were to remove her pk's from her overall goal totals, her numbers go down dramatically. However, she does have a size advantage and seems to know where the goal is at all times, so she works pretty well as a cherry-picker. I prefer players that are technically sound, more like Natasha Kai or, of course, Sinclair.

I think Abby gets a bad rap from a lot of people. Among other things, I think she's an excellent passer. An Abby-Christine front pair would be awesome, enhancing both of their scoring numbers.

I agree UPSF about Abby taking undeserved raps. After all, she has scored 100+ international goals. The only point I wanted to make is that I think Christine is a more well-rounded player, and that the two would have been a fantastic combination up front - they would have complimented each other well.

Abby Wambach is obviously not a bad player - you don't score that many goals in international soccer if you are a donkey. But her ball skills are not in the same class as Sinc. Look at the quality of their first touch on the ball: and I think you will see the difference.

i like abby a lot, but i agree that christine is the much better all around player! this was posted at some other time in another thread, but its worth another view.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKdJ37yPfHU&feature=channel

Thanks, Fozzie - I love that interview. I was actually thinking about it when I suggested the they would have been a dominating pair and would have complemented each other well. Interesting that Abby made Harry's point that Christine has such a great first touch

My opinion of Abby is improved by her agreeing with me!!!!

fozziewozzie wrote:i like abby a lot, but i agree that christine is the much better all around player! this was posted at some other time in another thread, but its worth another view.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKdJ37yPfHU&feature=channel

This video makes me appreciate Christine so much more, she is such a genuine and amazing player. I wish she could have stayed at UP and played for us... forever. But so excited for Sophie to be joining her (even if they play for Canada...)

remember, sophie came to us as a defensive player. through injuries she gradually got moved up, first to attacking mid then to forward. it was after that the canadian national team put her in those positions where she truly shined on an international level.

letsgopilots11 wrote:

fozziewozzie wrote:i like abby a lot, but i agree that christine is the much better all around player! this was posted at some other time in another thread, but its worth another view.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKdJ37yPfHU&feature=channel

This video makes me appreciate Christine so much more, she is such a genuine and amazing player. I wish she could have stayed at UP and played for us... forever. But so excited for Sophie to be joining her (even if they play for Canada...)

If Christine were still a Pilot, we certainly wouldn't now be 0-4 in the quarterfinals. We'll never see another Sinclair.

Sinclair Fan wrote:
If Christine were still a Pilot, we certainly wouldn't now be 0-4 in the quarterfinals. We'll never see another Sinclair.

whether we see another Sinclair may or may not be true. It's certainly true that no team in NCAA history has had a production from a player equal to Chistine's Senior year 39 goals. That's an NCAA record and judging from What it has taken to be a scoring leader since then, is likely not to be broken in my lifetime.

But we did have an NCAA scoring leader this year. and the team was among UP leaders for both scoring and defense.

Christine lead the UP team to a championship in 2002 with about the same number of goals Danielle had this year. You could argue that we played harder teams in 2002, but Chistine didn't necessarily score against those teams at a rate that made much difference. She didn't for example, score a goal against UNC in 2002, nor against SCU in the regular season, nor, for that matter, against Stanford (ranked #1 ) during the run of play. She did score against ND in 2002, but Danielle scored several game winners this year, so I think any comparison of superiority is a stretch.


What was the real difference? well, I think you could point to 2002 and 2005 seasons that were injury free, especially to star players. That hasn't happened to UP since the 2005 season. This year, for example, we had a season ending injury to perhaps our most dangerous player, and to 5 central defenders (2 of them season ending) during the course of the season. Through that all we still had the best defense of any contender. In head to head comparison against UCLA, for example, we did better against common opponents.

I think it hasn't been mentioned yet , but at least 5 players were being held out of practices last week because of illness. That may have had more than a little to do with how aggressive we were on Saturday.

I think sometimes you just have to have your horoscope right, and be lucky enough that you can have a strong enough team at the end of a long season.