Mia Hamm entered the Olympics with an international record 125 goals. But despite her success -- two world championship teams and a gold medal -- Hamm has yet to leave her mark on an entire tournament.

She still hasn't. But she did have her moments, scoring two goals, including one in the 2-0 semifinal win over Brazil. Yet, I get the feeling that something is not right with Hamm since she scored her 100th goal in 1998, whether its the pressure of trying to live up to all that hype or something personal.

Although her bank account might not show it yet, Tiffeny Milbrett has become the new attacking force of the team.

Former U.S. national coach Tony DiCicco extended and saved the career of Michelle Akers by turning her into a defensive midfielder. Coach April Heinrichs might want to consider a similar strategy by using Hamm as an attacking midfielder instead of at forward. It would take the pressure of scoring off of Hamm. Besides, Hamm is devastating coming down the wings.

Well, not this time. The Americans could have used her on the corner kick Norway converted into a goal for a 1-1 tie. The U.S. lacked a dominating figure in the middle of their defense. Don't get me wrong. Lorrie Fair played her heart out and was a major factor against the Norwegians, but there's only one Michelle Akers.

This was answered on Thursday night. While it might be unfair to blame 22-year-old Siri Mullinix for the third Norwegian goal, she must be held responsible for the second goal in the 78th minute. That's when Mullinix made the wrong decision to come out of her net and crashed into teammate Joy Fawcett as Ragnhild Gulbrandsen headed the ball into an unattended net.

"That's my style, that's my game," Mullinix said. "I'm going to play my style. It happens. I didn't get the ball and the ball hits her on the back and it rolls in. That's the game."

Mullinix flirted with disaster through the tournament, but managed to stay out of harm's way. Against a dangerous team such as Norway, you have to make the correct decision or pay dearly.

I'm not certain Heinrichs always pushed the right buttons.

Yes, her substitution of defender Brandi Chastain with forward Cindy Parlow with the U.S. leading China, 1-0, was a bold, aggressive move.

Had the U.S. prevailed or Parlow had scored, Heinrichs would have been hailed as a genius in some quarters. But the ploy backfired, or as they say down under, boomeranged. The Chinese scored several minutes later in what turned into a 1-1 draw.

Coaching doesn't necessarily mean just selecting the right tactical formations, getting a team mentally and physically prepared for a match, it also means player management, deciding on substitutions and when to rest players.

Did Heinrichs get the most out of the roster? Did she bring the correct players? If she did, why didn't she use them? Did she have confidence in them?

First of all, there was quite a drop-off between the starting 11 (plus forward Cindy Parlow) and the rest of the team. Outside of Parlow, who was a sub in all five games, midfielder Nikki Serlenga was the only other player to leave the bench (twice) out of a possible 15 substitution situations.

So, what came of the rest of the bench?

Briana Scurry, the back-up goalkeeper who was the star of the 1996 gold medal and 1999 world championship team, was never used. Veteran defender Carla Overbeck still hasn't recovered fully from her knee injury and did not play a minute, although her experience and leadership was lost vs. Norway. Defender Sara Whalen, who was used during the WWC, for some reason became a persona non grata. Defenders Michelle French, an 11th-hour replacement for Akers, and Danielle Slaton, also did not get off the bench, not even late in the 3-1 win over Nigeria.

In comparison, former national coach Anson Dorrance used 16 players at the first Women's World Cup in 1991. Former coach Tony DiCicco played 18 players at the 1995 event, used every player but one -- his reserve keepers -- at the 1996 Olympics and 1999 WWC.

Heinrichs used the same starting lineup for all five of its matches as seven players wound up playing every minute. The U.S. may be in excellent physical shape, even the most fit players start tiring, usually after 60 minutes.

The lack of fresh legs took its toll, especially in the waning minutes against Norway.

In contrast, Norway coach Per-Mathias Hogmo, who had to endure a yellow-card suspension of veteran defender Gro Espeseth and injuries, shuffled players in and out of the lineup, using five players off the bench. Remember, Dagny Mellgren, who scored the Golden Goal, was an 83rd minute substitution in the gold-medal match.

Norway was a better-rested side. "We knew the Americans would be tired in the end," Hogmo said. "We had fresh players to put in."

Now Heinrichs and the team has a long, long wait between major FIFA competitions. The next Women's World Cup isn't scheduled for 2003. That gives Heinrichs plenty of time to mold her team as a number of players contemplate retirement from the international game.

With two major events as the 1999 Women's World Cup and the 2000 Summer Games, the U.S. women were in the spotlight over the past 15 months. Now they'll step out of it for a while as the pro league takes over, at least for the short term.

These questions were answered.

OK, it's the men's turn:

This was my first and biggest question and I have to admit it didn't affect the team. The team meshed well together, creating scoring opportunity after scoring opportunity. A goal here or there would have brought another victory or two.

Not as much as I wanted. I would have loved to have seen Donovan start in the semifinal match against Spain. Yeah, I know he's a right-sided player and he supposedly would have been out of place on the left wing. But once in a while you throw caution to the wind. In three of the five games he played, the 18-year-old Donovan made an impact.

No problem what-so-ever. Friedel played well.

Dunseth, the team captain, was bothered by an injury and didn't play until the bronze-medal match. In his absence, Danny Califf became a starter and played a vital role before meeting his match against Spain and then Chile. Dunseth replaced Chad McCarty (yellow-card suspension), who played a strong match against Chile.

This is what I wrote in the Sept. 8 column: Just reaching the quarterfinals would have to considered a major accomplishment. The semifinals and chance for a medal? Now, that would be a feat of Olympian proportions. I'll still stand by that.

U.S. men must continue to grow

You can look at the American men's performance as whether the glass was half empty and half full.

A pessimist will say the glass is half empty, that the U.S. won only once and recorded a 1-2-3 mark in six matches.

An optimist would say the glass is half full, that the U.S. overachieved and surprised a lot of international soccer observers with their grit, talent and ability to survive.

I would prefer to look at it as half way. The U.S. took some important giant steps just to make the medal round and finish fourth here, but there is much still to be done.

The Americans were fun to watch at the Summer Games, in fact, more fun than the over-hyped women until their gold-medal match. Moreover, the men demonstrated a survival instinct that we haven't seen very often at the highest levels of U.S. soccer.

This team did what it had to do to not only reach the quarterfinals for the very first time in 12 Olympic soccer appearances, the Americans won their group.

Now it's time to pass the torch, as they would say here, to a younger generation. The first thing U.S. Soccer officials and coaches should do is to have every youth player in the national program watch tapes of the men's Olympic team as a reminder of how they scratched and clawed their way into the medal round.

It wasn't always pretty, but at international tournaments such as the Olympics and World Cup, they don't award points for beautiful play, only for wins and ties.

If the U.S. continues to learn how to survive, perhaps a quarterfinal or even a semifinal appearance in the World Cup, by 2010 won't be that far-fetched after all.

Looking way ahead to 2003

With a number of American players ready to call it quits in the next few years, the U.S. lineup could change dramatically for the 2003 World Cup.

I've taken into account that the two veteran central defenders, Carla Overbeck and Joy Fawcett, have retired, along with Mia Hamm. Yes, I think Hamm will call it quits, at least internationally, sometime in the next three years.

Here's one writer's look three years into the future on what the starting lineup and roster might look like:

Goalkeeper- Siri Mullinix. Defenders- Kate Sobrero, Michelle French, Danielle Slaton, Christie Pearce. Midfielders- Julie Foudy, Shannon MacMillan, Lorrie Fair, Nikki Serlenga. Forwards- Tiffeny Milbrett, Christie Welsh.

Reserves: Goalkeeper-The gut feeling here is that an even younger keeper will come up through the ranks, supplanting Jen Branam and Hope Solo. Defender- Nandi Pryce. Midfielders- Mary-Frances Monroe, Alisha Cramer, Aly Wagner. Forwards- Susan Bush, Cindy Parlow, Mandy Clemens.

Of course, we won't know how close this roster is until the summer of 2003. Can we put this in some sort of time capsule and then dig it out right before the tournament to see how close this is?

A historical perspective

The last time an Olympic soccer tournament was held down under was at the 1956 Summer Games in Melbourne. The competition certainly has come a long way in 44 years.

Of course, only a men's tournament was held, and that was rather short and sweet. Only 11 teams entered the competition. And since the tourney was a knockout situation, only 12 matches were played, and one was a replay of a quarterfinal tie between the Soviet Union and Indonesia.

For the record, the Soviet Union prevailed over Yugoslavia, 1-0, on Anatoly Ilyun's 49th-minute header. The real star for the Soviets was a goalkeeper named Lev Yashin, who allowed but two goals in five games and who eventually would achieve more international greatness. Yashin participated in three World Cups, stopped more than 100 penalty kicks and played for his country on 78 occasions. And if you were wondering, Bulgaria stopped India, 3-0, for the bronze medal.

According to newspaper accounts, Indian players wanted to play in their bare feet earlier in the tournament, but were refused. A player named Kannayan, however, took off his cleats at halftime of the bronze-medal match and played barefooted, according to the Melbourne Sun.

The gold-medal soccer game was played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground at 2 p.m. on Dec. 8, 1956, and that was followed by the closing ceremonies for the Olympics, which began around 4:30.

Don't think that would happen today, would you?

And here's a number that shows how much times have changed. According to the newspaper The Age, journalists sent more than seven million words back to their countries for the entire Olympics hrough the Overseas Telecommunications Commission. The OTC cabled more than 11,000 messages and 1,600 photos overseas.

Hmmm. Today, with all the media here and the ever-burgeoning Internet, it's probably closer to seven million words a minute being written.

Chip shots

In 1988, the Soviets prevailed over Brazil, Romario (who was the tournament's top scorer with seven goals and who tallied in the final) and Bebeto, 2-1, in extra time on a goal by Uri Savichev in the 103rd minute in Seoul.

In a wild encounter in Barcelona in 1992, host Spain managed to win the gold over Poland, 3-2, as Kiko (also known as Francisco Narvaez ) connected for the game-winner a minute into stoppage time before 95,000 spectators at famed Nou Camp Stadium. The match went back and forth with the Poles scoring first, the Spanish taking the lead with a pair of goals midway through the second half and Poland equalized in the 76th minute.

And in 1996 in Athens, GA, Nigeria capped amazing back-to-back comeback wins with a 3-2 victory over Argentina. Emmanuel Amunike scored in the 89th minute to break a 2-2 deadlock for the Nigerians, who rallied from a 3-1 deficit against Brazil in what turned into a 4-3 semifinal triumph.

Saying that, I'll probably let all of this go to my head and I'll botch up the men's gold-medal match. I'll go with Cameroon, 3-2, over Spain, for a second consecutive gold medal to an African team. Any team that fights in practice -- forward Samuel Eto'O and coach Jean-Paul Akono had to be separated by players during a heated verbal exchange -- must have a lot of fire and team spirit.

Non-Olympic chip shots

Counting the house. Here's another argument for MLS teams to have their own stadiums: Through 10 playoff games entering this weekend's games, teams have attracted 90,655 fans, total, which would just about fill up the Rose Bowl for soccer capacity. That comes out to 9,065 a game. Whatever happened to Soccer Saturday?

Only one of those 10 matches were played on a Saturday -- Colorado at Kansas City (8,682). Three were played on Friday nights and one on Sunday, the MetroStars' home game against the Chicago Fire.

Sounds like the playoffs are Anything But Soccer Saturday.

Lothar's corner

Nothing this week. Sorry. I'm out of touch here in the land down under.

Michael Lewis covers soccer for the New York Daily News. His third book, Soccer For Dummies, was published this spring.

 

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