SANTA CLARA, Calif. – The World Cup adventure rolls on for the U.S. men’s national team, thanks to a composed 2–0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina that sets up a Round of 16 clash with Belgium in Seattle on Monday.
Rest assured, the Yanks are happy to return to Puget Sound after what they experienced in their group-stage win over Australia last month.
“The Seattle crowd was lit,” keystone defender Chris Richards told reporters with a grin in the postgame mixed zone. “Hopefully, they come out for us again.”
That said, he and his USMNT teammates made clear they’ve been blown away – and most importantly, bolstered on the pitch – by the home support they’ve received in all four of their games thus far. On Wednesday evening, it was a packed house of 68,827 at the home of the San Francisco 49ers, offering a timely boost as the tournament’s co-hosts had to weather more than half an hour shorthanded after goalscorer Folarin Balogun’s VAR-imposed red card.
“It makes a huge difference, but I would argue every stadium we played in has made a huge difference,” U.S. captain Tim Ream said. “It’s been so impressive to travel around and play in front of crowds that are, I mean, just absolutely electric.”
If Emerald City denizens want to take that as a challenge to up the ante once more, that’s just fine with the national team.
“The problem that they’re going to have is they set a high bar in the last round, in the group stage,” Ream said. “Listen, we’re looking forward to getting up there again. We’re looking forward to playing in front of that crowd, and hopefully we can do something special again.”
The Yanks will have to dig deep again to navigate a path past Belgium, who defeated them fairly easily by a 5-2 scoreline in a March friendly in Atlanta – especially with Balogun, their leading scorer and arguably the most difficult player to replace, suspended.
The Red Devils are already well at home in Washington state, having selected the Sounders’ Longacres training facility as their base camp, and produced genuine magic at the venue usually known as Lumen Field to storm back from 2–0 down late to defeat Senegal 3–2 in extra time earlier on Wednesday. They also opened their group stage with a 1–1 tie with Egypt.
“We know very well that is a team full of quality,” said head coach Mauricio Pochettino of his side’s next adversary, who sit ninth in FIFA’s current world rankings. “And after a few games I’ve seen, for me is one of the contenders about to win the World Cup. Unbelievable quality, great coach, I know very well the coach [Rudi Garcia], and it’s going to be really tough, and it’s going to be very competitive.
“For us, it’s about to keep dreaming, is about to keep working really hard and competing, and all is possible. I think in football, all is possible if you believe, and we are going to believe that, with all the respect to Belgium, with our fans in Seattle.”
Surely, though, no one is looking forward to this next leg of the USMNT’s journey quite like Cristian Roldan.
“Yeah, the city’s going to be ready for us,” Roldan told Sounder at Heart postgame. “A lot of the guys have talked about the atmosphere there, and I know it’s going to be a good arrival for us to make good memories.
“We know that it’s going to be tough. We obviously have to learn from our mistakes in March and be ready for a team that can score goals.”
The Sounders icon also shared a bit of insight about his fitness status with Spanish-speaking media. A quad injury has ruled him out of the last two U.S. matches, though he sounds fairly optimistic of being available again soon.
“Yes, I’m improving, slowly but surely. I hope I can make it back for the next match,” Roldan said in Spanish. “I’m doing everything possible to get there, and the team is doing their part to help me return soon.
“It’s honestly very hard dealing with an injury like this and not being able to play in the matches,” he added. “But the truth is, I feel like part of the group because they help me with everything. They know I have the drive to get back out there – and I hope I can, because that’s what my teammates want, too.”
Like many of his colleagues, Roldan paid tribute to the togetherness and resilience of a squad who steadfastly maintain that they truly do believe they can achieve something special this summer.
“We’ve been at this for four years now,” he said. “We’re even more united than we were after the last World Cup. We’re showing that in our matches, through our intensity and mentality, and the truth is, we can win in different ways. Even when things got complicated, we showed the courage and grit to play a strong second half.”
