USMNT’s Matt Freese, others step up in potential defining moment for young USA soccer team at Gold Cup
If the Concacaf Gold Cup was supposed to be a test field for an inexperienced version of the American national male team, the quarter -final of Sunday against Costa Rica was a very trying exam. It is not only the fact that it was the first victory or offer match for this group, which is intrinsically linked to pressure, but a quick glance on the score will demonstrate that a 2-2 match which ends with a victory of 4-3 via a penalty shootout is accompanied by its own tests and tribulations.
In a back and forth match, it was the USMNT who conceded the first when Francisco Calvo converted a 12th minute penalty for Los Ticos, ended up going back to a 2-1 advance in the 49th minute despite their own first semester. It was time for the Costa Rica to return to the game before a dramatic penalty shootout in which Keylor Navas made two stops for Los Ticos and Matt Freese made three for the USMNT. In the midst of twists and turns, however, several players intensified, finally seizing the opportunity that head coach Mauricio Pochettino tried them.
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Freese delivered the most memorable performance on Sunday in Minneapolis, faced with seven penalties in total – including Calvo in the first half – and plunging the right path on almost all, saving almost half of these spotkicks and obtaining a touch to most of the others.
It was a decisive moment for the 26-year-old player, who may have been lucky in a starting place at the Gold Cup. Pochettino seemed to have the intention of exploring his options this month, bringing the first choice Matt Turner for the ride but not playing him so far in the competition. The role could have been fulfilled by the two goalkeepers who should make the cup, Patrick Schulte of the Columbus crew and the Zack Steffen of the Rapids of Colorado, but both stopped with injuries before the start of the Gold Cup. The opportunity fell to Freese from New York City, who may not always have his moments at stake regularly, but as he quickly joked in an post-match interview with broadcasters, admitted that “penalties are my thing”.
Freese was the type of outing that stimulated his references in what could be a competitive race to fill the goalkeeper positions during the World Cup, with a truly useful skill that some of the others in the pool have not yet demonstrated. Freese is a specialist in penalties at this stage-he won six of the seven shootings in which he participated in his career and could well be the choice of window break in an emergency next year, just like the Tim Krul of the Netherlands was in a shooting against Costa Rica during the 2014 World Cup.
While Freeese is the show, he was not the only booming USMNT player to build his case for the tournament next year on Sunday. The most likely candidate to do this this summer was Luna and although he had a slow start to the Gold Cup, he finally won his moment in the sun with the equalizer against Costa Rica. His goal was one of his three shots during the match, serving as a constant attack while the United States spent much of the first 50 minutes to keep the Costa Rica occupied. Luna was perfectly suited to a team that was energetic and intense during this spell, being tied months ago in Pochettino as someone who has the right mindset. The question for the midfielder was whether he could match the mentality with significant moments in the field and with a goal on Sunday, he begins to add to an international count which has it to a goal and four assists in 10 games.
Luna’s success means that there is growing competition to attack roles in the midfield, while the USMNT enters the last year before the World Cup, especially since Malik Tillman maintains a strong series of form and that Gio Reyna is on the bench of Borussia Dortmund at the Club World Cup.
There is a model similar to developing on the left back, although the one that resembles competition for guardian places rather than the starting roles for which Luna, Tillman and Reyna are fighting. Max Arfsten may have had an unequal performance on Sunday, but he also succeeded in several major moments by helping Luna ‘goal and scoring his in the second half, creating his own redemption arc after conceding a penalty in the 11th minute. Arfsten, 24, was dynamic on the left wing during the energetic start of the USMNT in the match, creating several teammates for chances and completing 83.3% of his passes in the third striker along the way.
His inexperience sometimes showed and it is difficult to imagine a world in which he replaces Antonee Robinson, who has been really excellent for Fulham and the USMNT in recent years. There is, however, an argument to argue that it is a better sub-study than Joe Scally, who filled Robinson’s shoes without success a few times, and Arfsen’s ability to play on the two wings is an asset.
The USMNT improvement room
The performance of Arfstten is emblematic of the global projection of the USMNT – they made progress on Sunday, but there are still visible imperfections. The high pace of the first 50 minutes was undoubtedly positive, just like the 11 shots and two goals they had generated at that time. Their shot creation ideas worked, especially since Arfsten commanded the left flank, but there were a lot of missed connections in the last third during this period. Combined with the fact that Tillman missed a penalty in the first half, the 1.47 goals expected that they gathered along the way have left something to be desired.
He also offered a brutal reminder of one of the longtime weaknesses of the USMNT – a reliable scorer leading the front line. In the absence of the Balogun injured Folarin and Ricardo Pepi and Josh Sargent, off-favorite, this responsibility fell to Patrick Agyemang. Like Luna, he had started to plead in question earlier this year, but has only one goal at the Gold Cup so far. On Sunday, he seemed out of locking with his teammates and hesitating on the ball, taking four shots but not having put only on the target.
There was a feeling of disconnection which was still present, in certain understandable ways but in other disturbing respects. These players are still quite new to each other, so the construction of chemistry will obviously take time, but after almost a month of work together, the first 50 minutes of the game have shown that their time together was starting to bear fruit. After taking the lead, however, the group collectively removed the foot of the gas – they took seven shots but did not put only one on the target, obtaining only 0.54 goals expected in the process. The majority came after the equalizer of Alonso Martinez in the 71st minute, however, and there was a period of the 50th minute at the 65th when the USMNT did not actually take a single blow.
In front of the semi-finals, there is always an incomplete feeling about this version of the USMNT, which may be expected by considering the long list of absent from the high-level Gold Cup. It is always difficult to assess whether or not this group can go to the end and win the Gold Cup, although they are at least the heavy favorites in the semi-finals on Wednesday against Guatemala, which have been in the Final Four for the first time since 1996 after an upheaval for Canada. This is almost a secondary point this summer, however – the pocket task was to find talents that can be associated with the main team once they recognized later this year and he found that, even if the compromise is that he has identified as many problems that he must help out with a year to the World Cup.
