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