Cyprus cup U 20's

by PurpleGeezer on Sat Feb 23, 2008 10:32 am

At the same time the WNT will be in Portugal for the Algarve Cup, the next competition for the U20's will be the Cyprus Cup. Scottish Football Assn.

Group 1: Canada,Russia, Japan

Group 2: USA,Netherland, Scotland

Matches start the 5th of March, Cup Final on the 10th. I haven't seen any announcements yet on ussoccer.com

Looks like the u20 national team players will be getting some more experience.

by PurpleGeezer on Sun Feb 24, 2008 9:10 am

The other teams in the Cyprus Cup are apparently full National teams. The USA u20's are the only Youth Team in the tournament, If I read the Big Soccer post correctly.

That means Sophie will be there, too, playing for the full CNT. CanadaSoccer (nice pic of Sophie, too.)

It's not real clear how these games will be counted. The CNT site calls the game they have with Scotland a friendly, and not part of the tournament.
Perhaps if they meet the US u20's, that's how that game will be counted, too.

At any rate, looks looks like a good test for the u20's.

by PurpleGeezer on Mon Feb 25, 2008 7:37 pm

The roster and schedule are out on ussoccer,com

This will be a good test for the Pilots on the team.

Note that Ellie is listed as a defender on the team this time around.

U.S. Under-20 Women’s National Team Roster
Cyprus Women’s Cup 2008
March 2-14, 2008
GOALKEEPERS (2): Kristin Arnold (Texas A&M), Alyssa Naeher (Penn State);
DEFENDERS (5): Lauren Barnes (UCLA), Kaley Fountain (Wake Forest), Lauren Fowlkes (Notre Dame), Elli Reed (Portland), Lauren Wilmoth (UCLA);
MIDFIELDERS (7): Amanda DaCosta (Florida State), Becky Edwards (Florida State), Sinead Farrelly (Virginia), Meghan Klingenberg (UNC), Teresa Noyola (MVLA Mercury), Ingrid Wells (Georgetown), Keelin Winters (Portland);
FORWARDS (6): Gina DiMartino (Boston College), Michelle Enyeart (Portland), Sydney Leroux (Sereno FC), Kelley O’Hara (Stanford), Brittney Steinbruch (Miami), Nikki Washington (UNC).

Group 1
Canada
Japan
Russia

Group 2
Netherlands
USA U-20
Scotland

Cyprus Women’s Cup 2008 Schedule
Date Match-Up Venue
March 5 USA U-20 vs. Scotland GSZ/Larnaca
Canada vs. Russia GSZ/Larnaca
Japan vs. Netherlands* Alpha Sports Center

March 7 Japan vs. Canada GSZ/Larnaca
Netherlands vs. Scotland GSZ/Larnaca
USA U-20 vs. Russia* Alpha Sports Center

March 10 USA U-20 vs. Netherlands GSZ/Larnaca
Russia vs. Japan Dasaki/Achna
Canada vs. Scotland* Alpha Sports Center

Placement Matches
March 12 5th Place Match GSP/Nicosia
3rd Place Match GSP/Nicosia
Championship GSP/Nicosia

*Non-tournament match

by UPSoccerFanatic on Tue Feb 26, 2008 12:24 am

I like the idea of Elli Reed as a defender. Imagine Elli as an outside overlapping defender on one side and Jessica Tsao as an outside overlapping defender on the the other. (Don't know who would play on which side.) Put two of the tall freshmen or Corey Nicholson (or Sophie?) in the middle. All of a sudden our defense starts looking really good. -- An ideal picture, I guess, that assumes the U-20 Worlds won't take Elli and Sophie away. scratch

by fozziewozzie on Tue Feb 26, 2008 2:20 am

uspf,
hate to disagree with you, but absolutely cannot see elli playing defense at all. while i luv elli, she is purely an offensive player an even then in the first half of her season she got knocked off the ball pretty easily. she improved defensively over the season, but not nearly enough to play defense 100% of the time. jessica is so much stronger physically an defensively then elli while possessing above average offensive skills. elli defensively i think possesses average defensive skills with above average offensive skills. elli is just too slight to play defense

by **A_Fan** on Tue Feb 26, 2008 8:09 am

Hopefully Megan Sweeney will be back at full strength to wrap up that other outside defender position that she played so well in 2006.

by UPSoccerFanatic on Tue Feb 26, 2008 1:01 pm

On further thought, fozziewozzie's right. So, with Sweeney and Tsao, who plays right and who plays left?

by PurpleGeezer on Tue Feb 26, 2008 1:58 pm

Sweeney played the right. I saw Tsao play both sides last year.

by bluffer on Sun Mar 02, 2008 10:15 pm

I want to congratulate Ellie, Keelin, and Michelle and wish them luck in Cypress. It is both an honor and a privilege to play for and represent the U.S. and it looks like all three have a chance of making the final team for the U-20 World Cup. I know some have dismissed the U-20's and other youth national teams as a waste of time when compared to the full women's National Team but the youth teams are a place to learn from National level coaches, play with national caliber team mates and compete against not only other u-20 teams but full women's national teams. That kind of experience is invaluable and will not only help them upon their return to the bluff but should be an aid in recruiting. Hopefully they will have the support of the coaches, athletic staff and school administration. I think that college and club coaches forget how important they are to the development of players and I think that their ultimate goal should be to develop players to a level where they are invited to play at the national level whether it be on a youth team or with the full National Team. I know that losing players to National team commitments will be hard on the college programs and there has been discussion of some coaches not letting their players go (North Carolina, USC) but that kind of thinking is a disservice to both the players and the National Team program.

by UPSoccerFanatic on Sun Mar 02, 2008 11:07 pm

I've heard this about UNC, but not about USC. Can you tell us more about your information source for USC?

by PurpleGeezer on Wed Mar 05, 2008 9:55 am

I got this off the Scottish FA site"

The Scotland Women's team are currently in Cyprus taking part in the Cyprus Cup. Their first match against USA's U20 squad got off to an unfortunate start with the US scoring in the 25th and 30th minute. Scotland fought back and Suzanne Grant scored a late goal for Scotland, however it was not enough to secure their first points in the tournament.

No word on which of our players played or who scored.

by PurpleGeezer on Wed Mar 05, 2008 10:11 am

The US is playing the u20 team, but all the other countries are playing their full WNT's in the Cyprus cup.

Today Canada beat Russia 2-1 on goals by new young player Julie Armstrong, and on a late goal by Kara Lang.

Christine played, of course. Sophie played the second half.

The interesting part of that is that it appears that Sophie came in for Armstrong at the forward spot between Sinclair and Lang.

It would be cool if that were so.....

Nuke Soccer

by Guest on Fri Mar 07, 2008 2:24 pm

Heard through the grapevine the U20's lost to Russia today. Tony changed the formation from the 4/3/3 they have been playing to a 4/5/1.

by PurpleGeezer on Fri Mar 07, 2008 2:54 pm

The game against Russia was the US's non-tournament match. The score was Russia 2 - USA 0
Diccico was probably experimenting,

There's finally a report on the USA Scotland match on Thursday

ussoccer game report

Michelle scored the first goal off a rebound and was taken down in the box to set up the second score.

Keelin and Ellie played. Ellie's wearing a low number, so perhaps she's playing outside defense?

by UPSoccerFanatic on Fri Mar 07, 2008 11:47 pm

If my reading of the Scotland box score is right, Michelle played 78 minutes. Elli and Keelin played the entire game.

Cyprus cup U 20's

Cyprus cup U 20's

It's better than I thought

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Cypress U-20's

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USA u20 2 - Scotland Nationals 1

Canada 2 - Russia 1

USA U20 0, Russia 2

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