The Final Blog of the 2013 19th Maccabiah for our Gold Medal Team

Well the Final Blog is finally here to write. I am having a tough time dealing with the fact that we are not still all together as a team. It is very hard trying to explain in words just how truly special this team is. You had to be with them in person to truly understand the magnitude of not only what they accomplished as a history making team, but just how incredibly special they were as people. I have had the good fortune of coaching some incredible players, teams and people over my long career, but I have never been with any group that made me as proud or as honored to coach them, as this team. There are no adjectives to describe my feelings for this team, other than to say Thank You for giving me the privilege to coach each of you. I will never forget this wonderful journey we all took together as a team. We had no best player or superstar, only a best team that was the Superstar.

Today, my wonderful wife Marie along with my great Assistant Coach, Greg Vinson, planned a Gold Medal Party at our college Hall of Fame Room. It was attended by family, friends, our college President and Vice Predident, staff and faculty, as well as current and former players.

It was an extremely nice affair, complete with lunch and slide show of our victories playing in the background. It was truly a highlight for me. And yes, I showed off the Gold Medal! I am enclosing some photos from the event above.

In summing us this wonderful journey, the only thing that could have made this even more special for me, was if my family had been here in Israel to be a part of this history making experience and shared it with me. That is my only regret about this experience.

In closing this incredible chapter of my coaching career, I must say how thankful I am for Maccabi USA giving me he opportunity to coach this outstanding team. It was and always will be the most important chapter and highlight of my long coaching career. To my team, you made my job so easy by just being who you were and believing in me as a person and as a coach. I can never begin to say, just how much each of you will always mean to me and I look forward to our first of many reunions together as a team! All I can say is simply, Thank You and I love you all very much.

Take care and stay well.

Coach G from home

Finals against Argentina, July 29, 2013

This will be a short blog for now just to let everyone know the result of our Gold Medal Game with Argentina. I will write a complete re-cap a little later.

We Won the Gold Medal for the first time in USA Maccabi History! We played a man down for 60 minutes, including the overtime. He was sent off for retaliation and we were leading 2:1 at the 60 minute mark. They scored about 10 minutes later to tie at 2:2. We played 2 15 minute overtimes and then PK's. we won in PK's 4:3 to win the God Medal.

Ok, time to re-cap this unbelievable accomplishment, by an incredible group of players. They were truly a team of Destiny!

Before we went on the field for our pre-game warmup, I told them in the locker room, I wanted to talk to them. What I said had nothing to do with strategy or tactics for the game. I just wanted to tell them how much I loved each of them and what a Privilege and Honor it was to coach them. I also talked to them about going through life and if they were lucky enough to be faced with a situation to conquer and be the very first to succeed in conquering that, it would be historical. They were confronted with that very situation tonight. Two other Maccabi USA teams (1981 & 2005) made it to the finals, only to lose, so we were the third men's open team in the history of the World Maccabiah Games to make the finals. I told them we would make history tonight and I ended by telling them just how proud I was of them and that they would be the proud ones in the end.

So we began the game and in the 5th minute we scored our first goal off a throw in from Ross Friedman to Alec Arsht ho put it in the back of the net for a 1:0 lead. It did not last long as a "phantom" penalty kick was called about 7 minutes later against us and they made the penalty kick to tie the game at 1:1. Needless to say, the officiating was extremely poor and the only calls were made against us. The half ended with the score still 1:1. We made a few slight adjustments in our attack at halftime in order to close space offensively.

The second half began and 6 minutes in at 51 minutes, we scored again. Another long throw from Ross Friedman found Eric Weberman on the far post who finished the goal to give us a 2:1 lead. About 9 minutes later, in the 60th minute, there was a foul on one of our guys and it wasn't called and we retaliated with our player now being shown the Red Card and ejection. We had talked about this before the game to just walk away from their baiting us. We would now have to play a man short for the remaining 30 minutes of regulation. About 5 or 10 minutes after our ejection, they scored he equalizer. Now we had to just hold on and get to overtime and then hopefully, penalty kicks. Hold on we did and even had a great chance to score on a corner kick and had some chances off of it, but we could not get it in the goal. Argentina was a difficult team, not to mention how dirty they were by coming in to us with cleats up into our legs and of course no call. There were so many things that the officials allowed them to do to us without any calls. We had two blatant fouls by them inside the penalty box that should have been called, but were not. One of their players even came off the field and shoved me back while I was in the coaching box to give his player more room for a throw in with the official looking right at him, but nothing was done, as usual. The game would end 2:2, so two 15 minute overtimes would be played.

We started overtime just trying to hang on and get to penalty kicks. Our team battled like I have never seen and we all knew we just needed to get there. Our defense with 10 men was superb and we were bending a little, but never breaking. The game ended 2:2 after 30 minutes of scoreless overtime, so penalty kicks would decide the Gold Medal!
This was the best we could hope for under the circumstances. They went first and missed. Our first also missed. Their second scored as did ours. Their third missed and we made ours to go up 2:1. Their fourth made his as did ours, so it
came down to the fifth kickers. They made theirs to make it 3:3 with our Captain, Scott Rowling ready to put the nail in the coffin. He hammered it home for the win at 4:3 for the good guys in red, white and blue. I would be remiss, if I didn't mention that our other Captain, Daniel Kohen broke his foot in the quarter final game against Germany and could not play in the semi finals or finals, as he was in a cast and crutches. We certainly missed him, but like always, someone else stepped up. He did have a great tournament for us.

In closing, this has been an incredible experience being with all of these guys and seeing how well they took to each other and our way of playing the game we all love. I told them the first day we were all together, that we could win the Gold Medal, if they would cast aside all egos for the good of the team and learn to play simple, like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on white bread and a glass of milk. They did just that to perfection! They Achieved the Possible by dreaming the Impossible! WE ARE THE 2013 WORLD MACCABIAH GAMES CHAMPIONS!!! Let's see how Gold tastes...

Just fine!

I guess I should close now, as it is 2:15 am here, but before I do, I must say again, what an Honor and Privilege it has been to coach this team. It was a fitting end to my Maccabi USA career! I want to personally thank my assistant, Warren Russ for being on this journey with me and all the staff, including our great Maccabi Manager, Dan Kurtz, that has been so helpful to both Warren, myself and this team. I also want to thank all our parents who came over and supported all of us with such enthusiasm. And to my family and Goldens, I will be home Thursday. I love and miss you so much.

Take good care,
Coach G from Israel

Semi Final Game against Canada, July 28, 2013

And the A-Train Keeps on Rolling and into the Finals, for only the 3rd time in Maccabi USA history! This morning we played our Semi Final Game against Canada and an old friend of mine from Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, who is their coach. His name is Alan Koch and he played against Birmingham-Southern College in the 1996 NAIA National Tournament. He was a tremendous player and is now the coach at his Alma Mater and is doing a great job there in the NCAA Division 2, making it last year to the final four. It is always special to coach against quality people and friends and he is certainly both.

As I said the A-Train is still rolling, as we defeated Canada by the score of 5:0! We have now scored 20 goals and only allowed 3 in our 5 games thus far. We have one more to go to complete our mantra of "dreaming the impossible in order to achieve the possible"! Let's get to the game and see just how ot unfolded. We came out playing like we have in the last three games, tactically (again, not making that mistake again). We were once again on that very small field (for the third time), but it has now become our old friend. In the 9th minute, our right back, Ross Friedman played a ball across, where David Rosenthal pounced on the bobble by their goalkeeper and hammered it home to make the score 1:0 for the USA. We have scored early ina our last 4 games, which relieves our defense of pressure. Seven minutes later, Kovi Knowiecki assisted Jake Pace for our 2nd goal. The score remained 2:0 until the 44th minute, when Evin Nadaner sent a through ball in to Eric Weberman on the left wing, who cut in and finished the ball in the back of the net to make it 3:0 at half.

We went into the locker room to sort out some issues defensively and talked about coming out still pressing the game and not letting them find their rhythm on this small field. In the 69th minute, Adam Zernik took a corner from the left side and played a perfect ball that David Abidor headed into the back of the net. The score now is 4:0 for the USA, with only 20 minutes remaining, plus any stoppage time. We made all 6 of our allowable subs throughout the half, trying to rest some of our guys. However, all of our starters and subs are equal in ability, so we never have any drop off in play. That is an added bonus for our team. In the 85th minute, we scored our 5th and final goal of the game. Charlie Paris, played a great ball to Will Pleskow, who finished it perfectly in the back of the net. The game would end 5 minutes later with the USA 5 and Canada 0. Thus the USA now advances to the Gold Medal Game Monday evening at 6:30 pm on the same field we played Germany on in the quarter finals. It is Givat Ram Stadium and it is a very nice field and certainly the best field in the tournament by far.

We all feel very proud and privileged to be representing our great Country and Maccabi USA in the Finals of the 19th World Maccabiah! This was our dream and we will live it tomorrow evening and I promise you, we will make everyone proud! Without being too redundant, I must continue to praise every one of our players and staff, especially my assistant, Warren Russ and our trainers. They have been exemplary in every way imaginable. My dear friend in Germany, Armin Kraaz, summed it up best about our team in an email to me yesterday. I have been talking about the "Team" being the "Superstar" and not the individual in all my blogs from the beginning. He defined Team for me perfectly to fit our team being the "Superstar". "T ogether E veryone A chieves M ore". I could not have said it any better than that. This Team truly fits that definition to the letter. I wanted to thank him for sharing it with me!

So, the A-Train will keep rolling tomorrow evening, when we tangle with the defending champions, Argentina, who beat Mexico in the last minute of play by the score of 3:2. Hopefully, we will make everyone even more proud of us by winning the Gold Medal, which they truly deserve. This is a Gold Medal Team in every possible way and I am so proud of them for never giving up hope on our dream! It is indeed an honor and privilege to be associated with each and every one of them.

I look forward to writing this blog tomorrow evening and hopefully extolling our virtues of winning Gold! To my wonderful family back home in Birmingham, Alabama, I love you all and miss you all very much along with my Goldens!
I will see you all soon.

Take good care and please keep good thoughts about us for tomorrow's game!

Coach G from Israel

Quarter Final Game Against Gemany, July 25, 2013

Above is our Winning Team! We advance to the Medal Round or Semi Finals against Canada! USA, USA, USA!!!

Good afternoon to all our loyal followers of my blog. I hope everyone is doing well. Today's game was a very special game for us, because it allowed us to advance to the final four teams of the tournament and the Medal Round. We didn't just win, we destroyed them by the score of 7:0! Let's see how it all happened. As I had said after the Uruguay game, we were not going to make the same mistake twice in how we played our opponents tactically. Since that tactical change, we have scored 15 goals and allowed only 2. Now to the game. Our first goal came in the 3rd minute on a cross from the right flank by Ross Friedman to our attacking midfield player, David Abidor, who scored easily to make it 1:0. 6 minutes later, David Rosenthal played David Abidor through for his 2nd goal, to make the score 2:0 for the USA. Our 3rd goal came 16 minutes later in the 25th minute, again with David Rosenthal assisting this time Jake Pace to make it 3:0. Then in the 45th minute, Evin Nadaner assisted once again, David Abidor for his 3rd goal of the match, all in the first half. The half came to an end with the score, USA 4, Germany 0. I am not sure I understood Germany's tactics of playing 5 in the back, 2 in he midfield and 3 up top, as they only defended and had just 2 shots the entire game. But, that was how they won their group over Great Britain and South Africa, two really talented teams.

Oh well, let's continue into the 2nd half. I made 3 of my allowable 6 subs at the start of the half. In the 54th minute, Will Pleskow sent a great cross in, to you guessed it, David Abidor for his 4th goal of the match. That made the score 5:0 for the USA. At that point I made my other 3 allowable subs and 3 minutes later, in the 57th minute, once again Will from the right wing sent another great cross in for Matt Kadoch, who headed it in the goal for our 6th goal of the match. 8 minutes later, Matt Kadoch played the ball back to Drew Rosenberg, who finished a great goal from his attacking mid position, to make it 7:0. From that point on in the game, I instructed our team to play possession and not attack, unless it was a one on one situation. Otherwise, play no more than 3 touches and keep the ball in our possession. There was absolutely no reason to score more goals against them. It served no purpose, but I also wanted to keep the shutout for our goalkeeper, Jacob Lissek, who now has played in two of our four games and has not allowed a goal. We have been splitting games with both of our keepers. This was the kind of game where I wish we could have subbed all our players in, but the rules are only 6 can be subbed in, so three of our players could not play. I had argued this rule, like others I have mentioned, but to no avail. I just hated it for our guys who did not get into the game. They understood, because they are team players and unselfish, but that did not make me feel any better about it.

So, now we move on to play Canada, a very big, strong team, who beat Brazil today in their quarter final game 1:0. This will be an extremely tough game for us, as they are very talented and we are once again on the tiny field for the third time in this tournament. The field we played on today, was a long field in comparison to others at 110 yards long, but again, very narrow at 60 yards. Even with those dimensions, it played much wider for us and the surface was outstanding. I wish we were playing there on Sunday. The finals will be back on that field on Monday evening and hopefully, with a little more hard work, we can make that game a reality. The other semi final game is between Argentina and Mexico. So, all four teams in the semi finals came from only two groups, with Argentina and Canada being in one group and Mexico and us in the other group. That is pretty interesting.

In closing, I can't begin to tell you how proud I am of all our players and staff, for believing in our system and doing their best to perfect it, in such a short time. After our opening game loss to Uruguay, we have had our backs against the wall in every game, making them must wins in order to keep playing. I truly believe that loss was extremely important in the development of our team and it's success thus far. This is the most unselfish group of players anyone could ever ask to be associated with, driven only to make the "Team" the "Superstar". We set out on this journey with one principle in mind and that was to "Dare to dream the Impossible, in order to Achieve the Possible". Well, we are just about to do exactly that, Achieve the Possible from our Impossible Dream! Our game on Sunday, is at 9:00 am, as is the other semi final game. If we win, we would play for the Gold Medal on Monday evening at 6:30 pm. Stay tuned, as it is getting exciting...

To my wonderful wife and family, including our Goldens, I miss and love you all so very much.

Take care everyone,
Coach G from Israel

Final Group Game against Mexico, July 23, 2013

Good afternoon to all who are following this journey of ours here in Israel. I hope everyone is doing well. Today was a very important day in the journey of our team. We had to win today against a very tough Mexico team in order to advance to the knock-out round or Quarter Finals. Before I go into the details of the game, I must first congratulate the Mexican Team and coaching staff. This game was what soccer is all about. What I mean is, Mexico played with great honor and integrity, the way the game was meant to be played. I thoroughly enjoyed this game, as it is what all players and coaches should want to be involved in. That is, everything rides on the outcome of the game. It is why we play and coach "the beautiful game"!

Now let's see how everything unfolded. We played once again on the smallest field in these games and going into this game, I was afraid Mexico would pack the box and play for a tie, as that was all they needed to go through. But, to their credit, as I said above, they played to win. It was an extremely clean and fair game for 90 minutes. It went back and forth, but I believe we had the better of the possession throughout the game. That's not to say they weren't dangerous on the attack, as they were very organized in their attack and caused us difficulties on their counters, epecially there number 10 up top and number 8 in the midfield. Number 10 is as good a player as I have seen in a very long time and he was a true gentleman. In the 10th minute, we had a one on one in the box, that we missed. In he 29th minute we attacked down the right flank to our attacking mid, David Abidor, who played a perfect ball across to one of our strikers, Jake Pace, who finished it first time in the back of the net, making it 1:0 for the USA. Unfortunately, 5 minutes later, we had a poor pass in the middle of the field and our defender left his man and number 10 finished it for Mexico, to tie the game 1:1. Now, a tie will send us home, so we kept pressing the game and in the 41st minute, Kovi Konowiecki, finished a great goal unassisted, to make it 2:1 for the USA at half time.

We stayed in our current tactical formation to open the second half, but We were somewhat lethargic to begin the half and it showed, as we made a bad foul in the 60h minute, on the top of the 18 yard box, to give them a direct free kick. Who else woukd take it for them, but number 10 and he hit a perfect ball upper 90 to tie the score again, at 2:2! Now, we really had to press the game, as time was running out on us and our future in this tournament. Well, we continued to show that there was no quit in this team. Our left back, Ryan Jones came forward with the ball and from 40 yards out he hit a left footed bomb in the upper 90 of the right side of the goal to put us up 3:2 in the 70th minute. It has to be the best goal of the tournament. His shot came 5 yards inside our half, as you remember, we are playing on 90 yard long field. We made some changes to bring in fresh legs to finish the last 20 minutes of game. We played 3 minutes of extra time for the first in any of our games and when the final whistle blew, we knew we had qualified to the final 8! There was great relief on our players faces! We deserved to win and be in the final 8 .

In wrapping up this report, I must tell you, I did not make the same mistake again, that I made against Uruguay in not playing the right tactical formation on this small field. I am so very proud of our entire team and my assistant coach, Warren Russ. They have believed in what we are trying to do and they have made me look good and for that I am most appreciative. I have been saying all long, that ths is a great group of guys and today they have made me even prouder to be their coach! It is my privilegevand honor to be coaching these fine young men!

Now we will play Germany on Thursday at 4:00 pm, on a regulation size field for the first time in this tournament and it should suit our style of play perfectly. So, until my next report after the Germany game, I will say it is great to be an American and go USA!

To my wonderful family, I miss and love you all very much, as I do my Goldens!

Coach G from Israel

Game against Denmark, July 21, 2013

Good morning to everyone in the states! I hope everyone is doing well and enjoying their week-end. Today was our 2nd game in Group Play and it was against Denmark. We played at a different venue and the field was a little bigger. The dimensions were 100 yards long by 64 yards wide, so at least we gained 8 yards in length and 2 yards in width. I think it was a better situation for our guys mentally. Let's re-cap the game now.

In the first half, we were all over them with our pressure, and in the 12th minute Eric Weberman played a great ball to our right winger, David Rosenthal, cutting in, who finished a nice goal to put us up 1:0. We had many more chances, but couldn't find the back of the net. We then sored off a corner, only to have it called back for pushing. I was not sure about that call. So, we go into half time with the score still 1:0 for the USA! We decided to make some changes in our formation for the second half to try and score more goals to help our goal differential. It worked! In the 69th minute, Evin Nadaner played a nice ball to Eric Weberman, who finished it in the corner of the net to make the sore USA 2 Denmark 0! In the 72nd minute, we struck again, with Scott Rowling playing the ball to David Rosenthal for his 2nd goal of the game. USA 3, Denmark 0. We had another goal called back for offsides, but he was clearly on when the ball was played. We then hit the crossbar and missed the rebound shot. In the 79th minute, we played the ball down the right flank and Ross Friedman, played a great cross for Drew Rosenberg to head home, making the score 4:0 for the USA! Four minutes later off a corner kick, Will Pleskow played the ball near post for the on-rushing player, Jake Pace to put it in the goal making our final score 5:0!

It was a good win for the team and it certainly helped our confidence to know we could still win and score goals! I was very proud of our entire team for re-focusing on the job at hand and not letting our first game effect us mentally. I think they showed they could play good soccer involving possession style and still win.

Now we must re-focus our energies and get ready for a war against Mexico on Tuesday. There has been a change of venue and time for that game. We will now play at 6:00 pm, but unfortunately on the "postage stamp" size field we played Uruguay on last Friday. I have been arguing with the Maccabi World Union, who runs this tournament, to not play us on that field, but to no avail. We are the only team in the tournament who has to play on that field twice. Thy moved us off the field that is regulation size and the field for the finals and placed Uruguay and Denmark's game on it. I could not reason with them at all and they really could not give me an answer as to why. The only thing they said was, all final group games must be played at the same time to avoid any collusion of not plying to win or tie. This is not the World Cup and no one would even think of that being a possibility. So, instead of leaving us on that field and moving the other game to another field, they move two games. Trying to reason with these people is totally a futile venture. Being rational never enters their minds, as they know everything.

Now we must not only prepare ourselves for Mexico, but for adapting to a field the size of a postage stamp. For goodness sakes, these are grown men in the highest division and to play these games on that size field is in my opinion, reprehensible on their organization. I am sorry to be so blunt, but the facts are the facts and they should be willing to listen and understand that it takes away from the integrity of the game. So, what shall we do? Win is the answer!

To my wonderful family, I miss you all very much along with my Goldens. Love and hugs to all!

The following is a link from our player, Scott Rowling's father who is sharing all his great photos from our first game with Uruguay. http://www.flickr.com/photos/hjr341/sets/72157634723801519/

Coach G from Israel

Game against Uruguay, July 19, 2013

Hello to everyone following along! Today we opened Group Play against Uruguay and it was not a good day for the Good Guys in Red, White and Blue. The final score was USA 0, Uruguay 1. Let's get into the game and see what transpired over the course of 90 minutes. To begin this re-cap, I would be remiss, if I didn't address the actual field, first and foremost. The actual stated dimensions was 94 yards long by 62 yards wide. I was under the naive impression after our technical meeting a few nights ago, that since they were using FIFA (the Internation Football Association) as the governing body for anything that was brought up, that surely, the fields would be normal dimenions according to the bylaws of FIFA. Boy was I mistaken. As mentioned above it was truly 94 by 62 yards. We are a possession type team and playing on a field that size certainly takes that away.

So the game began and we tried to possess as our game plan dictated. However, being as confined as we were, it took away anything we tried to do off the ball, as space was so limited. We wanted to pressure them the entire game, as they were very unfit, thus giving us the opportunity to win the ball in our attacking third of the field. We did a pretty fair job doing that, but everything broke down as we tried to string together some passes. It was nothing they were doing, but rather us not having a good first touch on the ball and also not passing to our players feet, where he is looking for the ball. With about 2 minutes remaining in the first half, we had a great chance to score, but we squandered it right to the keeper. I believe we would have then run away with the game. But, the half ended with the score 0:0, with us having more than 80% of the possession. So, we went into the locker room and tried to make a few suttle changes in our game. I felt, we would come out and score quickly and put the game away. We had our chances, that is for sure, but we had one really bad square pass in the middle of the field that was behind our player. They stepped in, won the ball and counter attacked us really hard at speed down the left wing. We went to the man with the ball and he crossed it on he ground to the back side of he goal and we had no one there. They slid and put it in! We mad our allowable 6 subs a little while later to try and get something going. It worked, as we kept attacking and had 5 really good chances to score, with their keeper making some very high level saves and us also hitting the crossbar and having multiple rebound chances, only to fall short.

In all my many years of coaching both on the college level and international level, I have never seen the kind of poor sportsmanship in a game, like they showed today. From the outset, it was so obvious that they were outmatched in every way possible, so their only hope was to take us out of our game. They were baiting us, taunting us and diving every time we came near and the Referee was doing nothing to stop it. It got so bad, that at one point they head butted our goalkeeper, right in front of the referee and all he did was talk to the player and tell him not to do it again or he would get a card. That type of foul is an automatic ejection, or it is in most countries. This was not how the game was meant to be played. You pay hard, but you play fair always. This was not the case with them, but as long as the referee allowed it, they kept doing it.

Did the better team, win? No, but on this day, we didn't deserve to win, but we Certainly didn't

deserve to lose either. Oh yes, there were two obvious hand balls in the box that should have been penalty kicks, but neither were called.

So, all in all, it was not the kind if start we were looking for, to say the least. But, we have two games remaining against Denmark on Sunday and Mexico on Tuesday. We must now win both games in order to advance to the quarter finals. Is that possible? Of course it is and we will do it. I have one last thing to discuss and that is, I should have played a different formation due to the size of the field. I thought about it, but chose to stay with what we had worked on the last two weeks. However, late in this game, we switched to that formation and started to get more and more opportunities at goal. Hindsight being what it is, I can only talk about it now and wish I had followed my initial instincts before the game. I can assure you that won't happen again. We took off one defender and brought on another offensive player. It really worked well, but still no goals. Soccer can be extremely cruel sometimes, in that the best team on that particular day, does not always win. Today was certainly that day, very cruel indeed!

So until Sunday, I will not write anything and hopefully, on Sunday, I will have better news in the good guys winning!

To my family and my Goldens, I love and miss you very much!

Coach G from Israel