The Ryan Blunder

Greg Ryan, after the U.S.’s 4-0 loss to Brazil in the Women’s World Cup, really ought to go down as one of the dumber coaches in history, and if he doesn’t, it will only be because of the profile of his sport. Solo thinks so too, and amid the caterwauling that she’s betraying the team and speaking out of turn, does it even matter that she’s 1,000 percent right?
“It was the wrong decision, and I think anybody that knows anything about the game knows that. There’s no doubt in my mind I would have made those saves. And the fact of the matter is, it’s not 2004 anymore. It’s not 2004. And it’s 2007 and I think you have to live in the present and you can’t live by big names. You can’t live in the past. It doesn’t matter what somebody did in an Olympic gold-medal game in the Olympics three years ago. Now is what matters.”

I’m not going to pretend to know enough about the relative merits of each player. But if Briana Scurry was the better player, she should have been in there the entire tournament. It’s so, so simple.