The Beginning of the End of the Road to Qatar
It’s finally here. The final round of CONCACAF World Cup Qualifying begins today, and no one has awaited this day more than U.S. Soccer fans. Yes, there’s excitement with this young, talented squad, especially after winning 2 trophies this summer against Mexico. But more than anything, it’s to get rid of the punch in the gut U.S. Soccer took back on October 10, 2017.
It was the last matchday of World Cup Qualifying. The United States sat comfortably in third place in the standings and controlled their own destiny in terms of qualifying for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. They would play last place Trinidad and Tobago while the teams behind them in Honduras and Panama faced tough matchups at home against Mexico and Costa Rica respectively. The U.S. had gone through a lackluster campaign, but it was hard to believe that everything that could go wrong would go wrong and the Stars and Stripes would be on the outside looking in. Unfortunately, that was a night when Murphy’s Law was in full effect.
The U.S. fell behind Trinidad 2–0 in the first half. However, there was no reason to hit the panic button as both Honduras and Panama fell behind in their respective games. With this combination of results, the U.S. would still qualify. And that’s when it seemed the fates decided it wasn’t meant to be. Panama equalized, despite the fact the ball never crossed the line (seriously, it wasn’t even close). Almost simultaneously, Honduras equalized in one of the most unbelievable goals you will ever see. Honduras’s Eddie Hernandez shot a ball that went off the crossbar then hit Mexican goalkeeper Guillermo Ochoa in the head and then went in the goal. Frankly, the moment I saw that goal, I had a feeling the U.S. was toast.
With both Honduras and Panama tying, the U.S. was still in and the fact Clint Dempsey had scored to make it only a 1 goal deficit had American soccer fans feeling optimistic. About 7 minutes later, Honduras’s Rommel Quioto scored to give them a 3–2 lead over in Mexico. Honduras now jumped to third place, but not to worry, as with the current combination of results, the U.S. finished fourth and would move onto the intercontinental play-off, but that meant a difficult matchup with Australia. The U.S. pushed forward but couldn’t equalize and all feelings of optimism were gone when Panama’s Roman Torres scored with less than 3 minutes to go in the game giving Panama a 2–1 lead over Costa Rica. Panama now jumped to third place, pushing Honduras to fourth and the U.S. to fifth and out of the World Cup, something that seemed impossible. Time kept ticking and when the final whistle blew, U.S. Soccer’s worse nightmare had just begun. For the first time since 1986, the U.S. had failed to qualify for the World Cup. Considering the U.S. is usually considered a regional power along with Mexico, saying this campaign was a failure and/or disaster was an understatement.
This exposed some of the flaws in the U.S. Soccer system that some talent and results had masked over in recent years such as the pay-to-play system, a steady replacement in goal for Tim Howard, and a partner for Christian Pulisic. On top of that, it appeared the U.S. took Trinidad and Tobago lightly, as the fact they were in last place made it seem like this game might be a cakewalk, but the Trinidadians came to play that night. While the U.S. may not have not done anything special at the 2018 FIFA World Cup, it’s always good to be present at the most important international tournament in soccer.
It’s now been close to 4 years since that fateful night and there have been major changes. One of the most important ones took too long, as a national team head coach wasn’t selected until a year later when Gregg Berhalter was finally hired at the end of 2018. The roster has been completely overhauled as the primary starters except for 3 are 27 years old or younger. Most of these starters are now playing abroad in Europe and the future is looking very bright. However, this squad hasn’t had much of a chance to play together, so these qualifiers will be a stern test.
Our first glance at this team was during the Nations League Finals. While this team won, there are still a lot of question marks in terms of chemistry and if Berhalter’s tactics are holding these players back. At times, the players seemed to depend more on their individual talent instead of working together as a team. Also, Berhalter’s style of play put this team in difficult positions that they were able to come out from due to some old school grit and resilience. I will say this about Berhalter though: he seems to have the respect of these players as the first person Weston McKennie looked for when he celebrated his second goal against Mexico was his head coach. This could be due to the fact these players are still very young and inexperienced on the national team scale, but any time a coach appears to have the respect of his very talented squad, it’s something that’s worth nothing.
That, among other things, will be important as the U.S. begins this final round of qualifying later tonight. The States start off against El Salvador, a team that showed a lot of spunk and promise in this past summer’s Gold Cup. The last time the U.S. played in El Salvador was back in 2009 in the qualifiers for the 2010 World Cup. El Salvador played very well for most of the game and jumped out to a surprising but deserving 2–0 lead. However, the U.S. didn’t fold and fought back to tie the game at 2. That tie felt like a victory especially the team looked dead in the water when El Salvador had scored their second goal. A lot has also changed with the Salvadoran team since that game.
Their head coach is former U.S. Soccer international Hugo Perez. Perez at one point was coaching in the U.S. Soccer youth system until being unceremoniously let go. He was one of best players to suit up for the U.S., but je doesn’t get the recognition he deserves due to the era he played in. An interesting note about Perez is that he was born in El Salvador, but moved to the U.S. at a young age. After gaining American citizenship, Perez played for the States in the 1984 Summer Olympics, helped the team qualify for the 1990 FIFA World Cup, which included scoring a game winning goal against El Salvador, and was able play on home soil in the 1994 FIFA World Cup.
Perez has been successful in recruiting Salvadoran-Americans to play for El Salvador. Among them are his nephew Joshua Perez and Alex Roldan. Roldan choosing to play for La Selecta makes for an interesting matchup as his brother Cristian plays for the United States and has been called up for this game. To say their household will be divided on who to root for is an understatement. El Salvador plays well but has problems finishing and scoring. Considering the talent the U.S. has, even with the fact they still have to work on their chemistry, this should be a game the States wins. It won’t be comfortable as playing an away game in CONCACAF is extremely difficult, so a blowout is something I find unlikely to happen. A lot has been made of Christian Pulisic not traveling down to El Salvador this game, but this team should be fine without him. While I think Pulisic is special and he seems to be unquestioned leader, I think he has serious competition in terms of being the best player on this team with the likes of Gio Reyna and Weston McKennie. McKennie is a box-to-box player that finds a way to be involved in everything and Reyna’s individual skill is outstanding. If these two players manage to connect, the U.S. doesn’t have much to worry about.
This will be a good test for this squad as then they have a difficult matchup at home against Canada in Nashville. I felt Canada outplayed the U.S. in the Gold Cup matchup and the States were lucky to escape with a 1–0 victory. On top of putting together some good talent, Canada is playing confident, which is something they have lacked. I honestly think they will their World Cup drought which dating back to 1986. Pulling off a huge upset against the U.S. on American soil would be a quite statement.
The next game for the U.S. features a tough trip to Honduras. The U.S. has been unable to win in their last two trips down there, but I figure they might finally win for the first time since 2009. Honduras will play hard and be motivated by a raucous, supportive crowd, but this team lacks the overall talent previous Honduran squads have had. Something the U.S. has in their favor is the fact this game will be played at night. The last two matchups down there were played in the early afternoon in San Pedro Sula, taking advantage of the local hot and humid climate to give the home squad the upper hand.
In these quick series of 3 World Cup Qualifiers, it’s not hard to believe the U.S. could come out of it with the full 9 points, but realistically, I think they come out with 7 as winning all 3 games even with this talented squad is a tall task. The road to redemption after a heartbreaking failure to qualify for the last World Cup begins now. While I’m not a big fan of Berhalter, I hope he finds the right formula to get the most out of this squad because it would be a shame to let all this talent go to waste. Winning the World Cup isn’t the expectation yet, but getting there after missing out for the first time over 30 years definitely is. In the words of Larry the Cable Guy, Git ‘Er Done!
