US lack of touch in front of goal

Between a porous defense and a lack of finishing we will always be second class. The article below (courtesy ESPN.com) does a nice job of examining the lack of production from forwards and the impact that can have on a team. I didn't consider the fatigue factor. If the US had converted more chances they would have been less gassed against Ghana. You can play these what if games all day long but I think its a valid point.

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- It's a hard game, this soccer, but it's a simple one.
To win, you must put the ball in the net.
And while the U.S. continues to improve, the country won't break into the world's elite -- and by that we mean appear in the World Cup semifinals and finals -- until it finds players who consistently show touch on the ball and score goals.
There has been much gnashing of teeth since Saturday's 2-1 loss to Ghana in the tournament's second round. U.S. Soccer President Sunil Gulati called the team's finish here a disappointment. "I think the team was capable of more," he said Monday.
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A day earlier, U.S. head coach Bob Bradley said pretty much the same thing. "It's a pretty empty feeling," he said, "because coming out of the first round, we felt there was a chance to do something bigger."
But as we've said already, the team got what it deserved -- a loss to Ghana. And we'll hammer home why. The team created scoring chances, as it had all tournament. And then?
It. Just. Could. Not. Finish.
This World Cup cycle, the U.S. clearly couldn't afford that. For much of the four years, the U.S. defense just wasn't that good. It wasn't just that the Yanks gave up early goals. They gave up goals, period. From the Confederations Cup, throughout qualifying, even in their friendlies. The Yanks rank 19th in the world in Nate Silver's Soccer Power Index, and all of the other 18 teams have a better defensive metric.
That didn't mean the U.S. couldn't be a good team. It clearly was. But that's only when the Americans finished chances. And that didn't happen enough at the World Cup, especially not on Saturday. The other team? "On the night, Ghana had three very good chances and scored twice," Bradley said.
Both Kevin Prince Boateng's, and, especially, Asamoah Gyan's goals were outstanding strikes, on dead runs, and perfectly on target. The U.S. just doesn't do that, especially not from distance.
There are few, if any highlights in U.S games where anyone hits a shot like Diego Forlan's strike for Uruguay against South Africa, or Carlos Tevez's bolt to help Argentina beat Mexico, David Villa's 40-yarder for Spain against Chile, or Valter Birsa's blast for Slovenia against the U.S.
Those goals make the game easier for a team, and it's hard to remember the last time the U.S. got one. In more than a year of watching the Yanks' A-team closely, only Ricardo Clark's long, bounding goal against Trinidad stands out as an important shot that came from distance.
What does stand out are missed chances. The U.S. had many in the tournament, and three in the last game: one by Robbie Findley on a breakaway, another by Michael Bradley on a left-footer in the box and the final by Jozy Altidore on a tough turn at close range.
If any of those go in, we are not having this discussion. But they're indicative of the U.S. team's problems with scoring, especially from the forward slot. "We've gone two World Cups without a forward scoring a goal," Gulati says. "That's not a good thing. That isn't blaming the guys who've been playing forward for us. It's just a statement of fact."
Germany's Miroslav Klose had a ball into the box not unlike Altidore's that he turned into a 1-0 lead against England. Mexico's Javier "Chicharito" Hernandez blasted one in from close to the same spot as Bradley's shot. And Arjen Robben turned a run similar to Findley's into a splendid goal for the Netherlands against Slovakia on Monday.
Granted, those are all world-class plays from great strikers. But the U.S. doesn't make those plays. And those plays, as we said, make the game easier.
Consider this. What if Altidore had hit the net instead of the post after a great second-half run down the left sideline against England? Instead of a lucky draw, the Yanks open with a 2-1 victory. They can sit back and defend against Slovenia from the get-go, try to settle for a draw and conserve energy. Or what if the U.S. converted one of its many regulation-time chances against Algeria, including open-net attempts from Altidore and Dempsey, and didn't use up quite as much of its emotional resources just to get through to the second round?
A final hypothetical, based not on finishing but what happens before the finish in the attacking third. After giving up the early goal (words typed too often this year) against Ghana, the Yanks regained control of the match in the latter part of the first half. Findley's miss was the start of a series of threatening possessions. But each one was fruitless. One ended in a too-long Bradley chip, another on a bad touch by Altidore, a third in a poor corner kick, and a fourth with a Steve Cherundolo cross that was too long for an open Clint Dempsey in the 45th minute.
What if just one of those passes or touches had been on? And what if one of them led to a momentum-shifting goal just before the half? Yes, you could play this game all the way to the next World Cup. But it's useful, because it shows what the Americans still lack.
"I don't think it takes a lot of watching to know that Tevez and [Lionel] Messi have a different control over the ball than most of our players, or most of the players in the world for that matter," Gulati says. "We've got to be better."
Until the U.S. touch gets better -- and the country produces players who hit goals that make this hard game easier -- the Yanks will continue to bow out of World Cups sooner rather than later.
Effort is great. Will is admirable. Determination is inspiring.
But that all can get you only so far. Sometimes, you need a few wonder strikes.