USA Edges Guadalupe 1 - 0

On Tuesday night the US Natrional Soccer team edged Guadalupe 1 - 0 to advance in th CONCACAF Gold Cup tournament, thereby averting elimination from the tournament had they lost the match.

But despite this win, it is now very clear that this team is simply not clikcing on all cylinders.  The sole score of the night came in the 9th minute when Jozy Altidore unleashed a cannon shot on goal from outside the box, giving the Americans the only sciore of the night.  It was a terrific goal.

Unfortunately, it reminds us that there has been precious little goal production from Altidore until now.  This was a weird match-- on one level, the US absolutely dominated Guadalupe, outshooting them 21 - 5.  But on another level, it was painful to see, over and over, our inability to finish off scoring chances.  Landon Donovan seemed listless and failed to finish his chances, and neither did Michael Bradley.  Clint Dempsey, Britain's favorite Texan, failed to convert any of his five chances.  Despite dominating Guadalupe, we just could not score.

And so there it is: given our history of giving up a goal before waking up and playing football, and then the recent rout by Spain and the loss to Panama and now this almost-comical performance, and its clear that the US national team has scoring problems.

So now the USA advances in the tournament.  Well that at least is good news.  However, the outcome of this tournament is now less important, than resolving the painfully obviousl scoring problems this team has shown the last few years.

We need a world-class striker up front.  Or two.