USA forward #10 Christian Pulisic (C) runs with the ball during the Qatar 2022 World Cup Group B soccer match between England and USA at Al-Bayt Stadium in Al Khor, north of Doha on November 25, 2022 ( Photo by Paul ELLIS/AFP) (Photo by PAUL ELLIS/AFP via Getty Images)
AL KHOR, Qatar — The U.S. men’s national team outplayed, and at times even dominated, England at the World Cup on Friday night, and before we get to the score or the implications, it’s worth setting it straight.
The Americans outran and outmatched the English. They outwitted and almost beat a favorite at the 2022 World Cup. They proved that progress is very real and the future is very bright, but after 90 intense minutes at the Al Bait Stadium, they had nothing to show for it.
They drew with heavily favored England 0-0 and will go into Tuesday’s final day of Group B having to beat Iran to progress. The point, after all, wasn’t all that different from losing.
But the performance was emphatic, brilliant, inspiring and authoritative – and exactly what the USMNT had promised it would be.
They came with audacity and exuberance, with confidence and faith, with grandiose plans to impose themselves on the self-proclaimed inventors of the sport. “We’re going to hurt them,” USA head coach Greg Berhalter said Thursday. “We know it’s very good [England] team, we know they have threats, we know we have to be cautious about their threats. But we want to play our game.”
And they did.
For 15 minutes, they battled their nerves and survived the early scares. They then grew into the game and by the middle of the first half had taken control of it.
They sat in a 4-4-2 without the ball, an adjustment from Wales’ game, and fixed a few structural flaws early on. Then they started to break. Weston McKenney pushed them forward. England were suddenly back on their heels.
They were playing against a team of major league stars, a team worth over half a billion dollars. And they, at one point in their lives, were overlooked teenagers, or second division players, or even small college backup goaltenders.
But here they are, on sport’s biggest stage, surpassing Harry Kane, Raheem Sterling and Jude Bellingham.
Here was McKenney, often interrupted by the youth national teams, spinning around a Briton in midfield and scoring in the box.
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Here was Walker Zimmerman, the pride of Furman University, stepping in for massive blocks.
Here was Hadji Wright, finally in the USMNT after five really tough years in the youth ranks, trying to convert an England defender in the box.
Here was Matt Turner, he of SportsCenter Not Top 10 infamous as a sophomore at Fairfield University, bursting to his right for key saves and hitting Pulisic’s 70-yard half volley on a dime.
And then Pulisic ripped a left-footed shot off the post.
“It’s called football!” chanted thousands of American fans as their English counterparts buried their chins in their palms.
The USA played without fear, just like the players said they would. “Intimidation factors?” linebacker Tyler Adams said when asked about them in a press conference the day before. “I wouldn’t say there’s much that scares me other than spiders.”
A day later, he raced around the midfield and raced back to break up an attack early in the second half with a colossal strike on Bukayo Saka. He beat Mason Mount to balls and kept England in their own defensive third position.
The Americans remained in the lead after halftime. They won a few corners. And Pulisic, after rallying the American fans behind the south goal, took three successive corners that required huge tackles from Harry Maguire in the six-yard box.
After 70 minutes, England regained their position and the game slowed down. Chances are gone. And costly first-half misses, most notably McKenney’s, loomed large.
By then, the USMNT had already made their point. It may not have completely “changed the way the world views American football,” as was its stated goal, but it certainly took a step in that direction.
It will all be for naught, however, if they fail to beat Iran, whose stunning stoppage-time performance against Wales hours earlier changed Group B’s calculation for the USMNT. The Americans spent months calibrating their expectations as if a draw with England would be a good result, and that’s what the US ended up getting. But Iran’s victory reduced the benefit of the tie.
So it’s a win-and-go against Iran on Tuesday (2 p.m. ET, Fox/Telemundo). Anything else would send the Americans home in just nine days. Their backs are officially against the wall and their chests are likely to crash into a parked Iranian bus.
They were impressive. But their World Cup, after 180 minutes, hangs in the balance.
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