The 2006 World Cup is over for the United States team. And while we want to blame bad decisions on referees and bad luck injuries, our guys didn’t come with the same passion as underdogs that they did in 2002. We needed some help from the Italians and we needed to beat Ghana in the last game. The Italians beat the Czechs so it was in our hands; beat Ghana and we go through. We lost 2-1.

We were in, arguably, the hardest group of the whole tournament. Some will point to group C (Argentina, Netherlands, Serbia & Montenegro, and Ivory Coast) as the group of death but I would argue that Argentina and the Netherlands had a pretty easy time with the other two and, therefore, our group, group E, was the hardest.

It didn’t do us any good that the Czechs realized the importance of game 1 and came out firing against us. We expected to sit back and wait for our chances (which didn’t come) and we were easily beaten. So, just like going up 3 goals on Portugal in game 1 of the 2002 World Cup gave us the momentum to narrowly escape with a victory and get out of the group, going down 3-0 in game 1 against the Czechs took any hope away; it took the wind out of our sails for the remaining games. Yes, we did well against Italy and that’s something to take away from the tournament, yet, I just can’t help but think that we went into the whole thing with blinders on. We had too much swagger and not enough guts.

Much has been said of all the cheerleading that was done in the build-up to the World Cup. Because of our run in 2002 and the FIFA rankings (which everyone knows is lame), we came into the tournament with the following false expectations: the Czechs were old and slow - easily beatable, we could draw with the Italians, and we could easily win against Ghana because Michael Essien was the only player we’d ever heard of.

Let’s be honest. We’ve never come close to being the 5th best team in the world. Maybe, the 25th best team is more realistic. The only European teams in the Cup that we could possibly be better than are Poland and, although they didn’t live up to how well they qualified, Serbia & Montenegro. We are not better than any of the South American teams in the World Cup. And, several of the African teams are better than us, especially Ghana.

And while Landon Donovan is a huge part of my Los Angeles Galaxy, I don’t want to see him wearing the USA jersey for a while. He was a no-show in all three games and I think his play has deteriorated while playing in Major League Soccer. He came into this tournament talking, almost exclusively, about how much confidence the team had. Sorry, but confidence doesn’t win games. Over the past couple of years, he should have been challenging himself in Europe and bettering himself as a player, not “building his confidence” in MLS. Otherwise, go back to being the “best player in MLS” and stay away from the National team. Its not fair to the rest of the team and to all US Soccer fans to wear the captain’s armband (when Reyna doesn’t), living his cushy life in California, and playing like that.

US Soccer has a beautiful history and a bright future. We just need to realize that we’re not going to beat the world. There’s always the same sports writers that come out at World Cup time to write the “Has Soccer Arrived Yet in the USA?” or the “Soccer will never make it in the USA” articles. Football (its rightful name) has arrived, it arrived awhile ago, and its not going away. Right now, we need to concentrate on just playing the game and having our teams play against better competition. Brazil isn’t the best because they had a plan to beat the world. They did it by making it their own.