A match with Mexico is rarely going to be a friendly and the starting lineup, substitution patterns, and physical play in this match certainly bore that out on Saturday night in Arizona.
The US started one of their most veteran lineups of the international break with familiar faces like Antonee Robinson, Chris Richards, and Tyler Adams leading a squad that featured eight players who were on the World Cup squad. The newcomers were Julian Hall, Cavan Sullivan, and Diego Kochen, who would become the first
keeper to play a full match for the USMNT this international break. In each of the first two matches the four keepers in camp have each played a half. However, tonight Kochen would play the full match and keep the clean sheet.
Thanks to the clean sheet and record setting goals the US would defeat Mexico 3-0 on the evening. Julian Hall scored in his third straight match for the US after Mexican keeper Raul Rangel failed to deal with a fairly innocuous fizzed ball from Gi Reyna across the six and Hall was in the right spot at the right time once again to give the US the lead in the 29th minute.
Things would stay level until midway through the second half when a second gaffe by Rangel was pounced on by a pressing Cavan Sullivan who immediately chipped it past the Mexican keeper who was ten yards outside his box. The ball nestled into the bottom of the net and the dos-a-cero goal made Sullivan the youngest ever goal scorer, surpassing Mathis Albert who just set the record on Tuesday, but is half a year older than Sullivan who just turned 17 on Monday.
Five minutes after the goal Mateo Chavez would loose his cool, fouling Yunus Musah and then slapping Sebastian Berhalter who was rushing to back up his teammate. The ref did not miss this action and Chavez was shown red. Perhaps it was a devious tactic by the Mexican team to avoid another dos-a-cero final.
If that is what they were looking for then Malik Tillman was happy to oblige them, scoring a third US goal of yet another Mexican mistake as a series of poor passing led Tillman to be passed in on goal by the opponents.
Once again there were multiple goal scorers and some nice team sequences. We could name a man of the match but that’s not how we do things around here. We want to know what you think, so hit the ratings below and let us know who you think should receive the Man of the Match honors.
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