This may be a friendly, and there may be a few more international windows between now and a World Cup largely hosted at home in the US, but things are uncertain and tense within the USMNT camp. Several high profile players were left out of the squad, and Pochettino has said this is the last window wherein he will judge players before solidifying his preferred roster going forward. Combine that with a very public feud Pulisic and Poch have recently engaged in, and are now trying to put to rest, this is a volatile situation. Poch may be interested in experimenting and evaluating, but another embarrassing window for the team he manages may be tough to take.
Enter South Korea and (later this week) Japan. Neither a pushover, neither dealing with a lot of confusion with squad makeup. Today, it’s 23rd ranked South Korea.
Of course, South Korea’s most notable star is Son Heung-min, who recently made the move to LAFC and is in decent form, but the side also features Lee Kang-in of PSG, and a host of players familiar with each other and ready to click on the field.
Who will the USMNT field? The answer is certainly Christian Pulisic, who has done well so far in Italy this season, but the rest of the 11? Not sure, but I’ll be sure to post something in the comments as they are announced.
Pochettino will certainly try to spin results in a positive direction, and he will hope that today’s performance is conducive to his narrative. We’ll see.
How to Watch
USA vs. South Korea
Advertised Kick-off Time: 5:00pm Eastern, 2:00pm Pacific
Venue: Sports Illustrated Stadium, Harrison NJ
Available TV: TNT (English), Telemundo (Spanish), Univero (Spanish)
Available streaming: Max (English), Peacock (Spanish), Universo Now (Spanish), FuboTV (Free Trial)
Starting lineup:
Son almost walks it in, whistle had blown without an obvious advantage. Decent stuff by Freese, regardless
US has some good interplay and momentum now in the 8th minute. Still 0-0
Andddd Son scores against the run of play
Gotcha. We get up the field and try to break stuff down, SK gets two goals off counter attack in basically a moment. Cool, cool
I think we’re just a bad national team. And the march to the end of the group stage next summer is a death march.
Is this DC United game thread?
Peglow with a bicycle golazo!
2 minutes later, Club America carve up DCU defense (by which I mean David Schnegg) and get an own goal out of dangerous centering pass.
A minute later, DCU gets a break down the wing and Caden Clark gets his first.
It finishes 3-1, for DC United who were looking pretty good in attack anyway.
In the final minute of extra time, it looked like DC might have a fast break attack, but Hopkins pulled up with the ball, and it looked like the team would be content to just kick it around and kill the clock off, but then the ball went to Benteke who had other ideas after being beaten up much of the 2nd half. He ran at the defense and sent Pirani in on goal with a nice pass. Pirani finished with what would’ve been the last kick of the game if he had missed.
USMNT played well. 17 shots to 5. 5 on target to 4 54% possession. 6 corners to 3. Difference was MOTM Korean keeper. Made several fantastic saves including double reaction save in 90th minute. I’m encouraged.
Any Commentariat at Club America match? What a cynical cash grab!!!
To DCU credit post-match facts on DCU website provides decent summary.
I did provide updates during the second half, about the scoring. Just scroll.
Definitely out of character for DCU to actually report on a match, much less an exhibition.