Key events
36 min: Dangerous Panamanian cross, and it’s another corner kick. Panama have been trying some fun wrinkles on their corners, but this one ends up with a wayward long pass out of play.
33 min: Adams is stripped of the ball at midfield, and Robinson ends up fouling Martinez. The referee plays advantage but comes back after the play to give Robinson a yellow card while Martinez stays down.
32 min: Turner punts. Balogun is offside.
The mental lapses in this game have been extraordinary.
30 min: Corner kick to Panama, and they take it to the top corner of the penalty area to someone left completely unmarked. The USA get away with one there.
Reminder: Tyler Adams is NOT fully fit. He only played 45 minutes in the opener. With the USA getting overrun in center midfield and at center back, can they afford to leave him out there now?
29 min: At what point should Gregg Berhalter consider a sub to shore things up defensively?
The answer might need to be “soon.” Panama is crossing the ball into the penalty area at will. Antonee Robinson can only do so much.
Goaaaaaal! USA 1-1 Panama (Blackman 26)
Just what the USA did not need. Everyone reacted slowly in the middle of the field – in fact, it was left back Antonee Robinson who came over to close things down, but the ball lands at Blackman’s feet, and the defender neatly places it dead straight and just inside the post.
There was a VAR check, perhaps to see if Gio Reyna was fouled in the buildup, but it passes without an on-field review.
25 min: A bit of possession for Panama, but an unusually bad touch for Carrasquilla sees the ball sail out of play.
Possession stat: Panama leads 62-38. Who would’ve thought?
Antonee Robinson raced up the left and got the ball into the penalty area. He runs into traffic, but the ball goes back to the Monaco forward Folarin Balogun, who drills it off the far post. It caroms across and nestles back into the net on the near side.
A highlight-reel finish, and a vital one for the USA so soon after going down to 10 men.
Gooooooaaal! USA 1-0 Panama (Balogun 21)
Golazo.
20 min: “There’s no controversy about that decision,” says Fox referee expert Joe Machnik. Indeed there isn’t, especially because the ball was nowhere near anyone involved. It’s not as if someone was challenging for the ball and just got a little reckless.
The USA go on the attack …
Red card to Timothy Weah
After a very brief check of the replay, Barton comes back out and, as has happened so often in this tournament, he makes an announcement that no one can hear over the crowd. But he clearly waves off the yellow card and then produces red to Weah, who was already walking off.
Horrible lapse in judgment by the US forward there.
15 min: Turner takes the goal kick.
The Fox commentators are debating whether it was a yellow card. John Strong notes that Antonee Robinson was right there with Blackman and might have made it difficult for the Panamanian to bail out of the collision.
Then we have an off-the-ball foul, and Timothy Weah picks up yellow. Replay shows Weah got the last word in a back-and-forth shove/slap battle, and whether you think it was too hard or not, it’s not a smart play.
Especially now that VAR has asked the referee to take another look.
14 min: Turner is up, but the training staff is still working with him.
Horvath also has passed through Nottingham Forest. He’s now with Cardiff.
12 min: We have players down, as a cross is played in and Matt Turner collides viciously with Cesar Blackman.
Commentator Stu Holden thinks Blackman recklessly charged into Turner, but I don’t think so. He had the right to go for the ball.
But the actual impact might be far greater than a card. Backup keeper Ethan Horvath is warming up.
10 min: Free kick to Panama at midfield, and they use it to maintain possession.
Until they launch a … shot? From about 50 yards out? Turner has to take a couple of steps back and jump.
And then Panama regain possession and play direct again, forcing Turner to race out of the penalty area and clear.
Nervy stuff here. Panama have started brightly.
8 min: That was a long check, but from the one (1) view we’ve seen, it seems to be correct. Ream was ahead of everyone when Richards headed the ball on frame. If he hadn’t touched the ball, maybe he could’ve gotten away with it, but he was the one who poked it back to McKennie, so the VAR had no choice.
Referee Ivan Barton does what appears to be some tai chi exercises while waiting for the VAR folks to decide on things.
Noooooooo goal! USA NOT 1-0 Panama (McKennie 5)
Pulisic whips the free kick into the middle of the penalty area, where Richards rises above the crowd. It’s saved off the crossbar and post, and Ream pokes it back to McKennie, who slams it into the net.
But was Ream offside? They’re taking a look …
4 min: Joe Scally runs into trouble on the right flank and is fouled as he tries to retreat with the ball. The referee waits to see if advantage materializes. It doesn’t, and we have a free kick. Well done to the referee.
And then Scally gets deep down the right flank and is more obviously fouled. Not sure who had “Scally draws two fouls going forward in the first five minutes” in the pool.
2 min: CHANCE for Panama. After a “foul” (not sure Carrasquilla ever decided what body part was supposedly injured), Panama go direct down the left and cross in. It’s partially cleared, and Barcenas tries a bicycle kick that goes just over the bar.
The USA also got down the flank and crossed already. Beats watching the Euros, doesn’t it?
Speaking of Fox, the commentators note that a lot of streets are closed in Atlanta near the stadium. Some sort of political thing – a couple of guys running for office are arguing?
Anyway, PEEP … kickoff.
Joe Pearson writes: “Glad to have you back on the Copa MBM. In protest of Fox’s generally dreadful coverage, I am watching on TUDN. Do I speak a lick of Spanish? No, why to you ask?”
You’re not alone. But I think we have a good crew tonight. And in some cases, the technical mistakes and the arguments are endearing.
The bad news for the USA …
The last three matchups against Panama went as follows:
Oct. 10, 2021: Panama 1-0 USA, World Cup qualifier
March 27, 2022: USA 5-1 Panama, World Cup qualifier
July 12, 2023: USA 1-1 Panama (Panama wins 5-4 on PKs), Gold Cup semifinal
Now the good omen: The referee in the 5-1 win was Ivan Barton of El Salvador. Guess who’s reffing tonight?
USA lineup
Unchanged from the opener
Matt Turner (Nottingham Forest, England) in goal.
Antonee Robinson (Fulham, England), Tim Ream (also Fulham), Chris Richards (Crystal Palace, England) and Joe Scally (Borussia Moenchengladbach, Germany) across the back.
Gio Reyna (Nottingham Forest), Tyler Adams (Bournemouth, England) and Weston McKennie (Juventus, Italy) in midfield.
Christian Pulisic (AC Milan, Italy) up front and operating primarily on the left, Timothy Weah (Juventus, Italy) across the field on the front line, and Folarin Balogun (Monaco, France) in the center.
McKennie picked up a yellow card in the first game.
For comparison purposes, Transfermarkt rates every US starter ahead of the 4m mark aside from Ream, whose value is diminished a bit by the fact that clubs generally don’t spend a lot of money on 36-year-old center backs.
Panama lineup
I’ll assume everyone here is familiar with the domestic leagues in Guatemala and Azerbaijan, so none of these players should require much of an introduction.
The goalkeeper is Orlando Mosquera (Maccabi Tel Aviv, Israel).
We’re expecting five defenders. Left to right:
Eric Davis (FC Košice, Slovakia – briefly with DC United)
Edgardo Fariña (Municipal, Guatemala)
Jose Cordoba (Levski Sofia, Bulgaria)
Roderick Miller (Turan Tovuz, Azerbaijan)
Cesar Blackman (Slovan Bratislava, Slovakia), who replaces Jose Luis Rodriguez (also known, Brazilian-style, as “Puma”) in the starting XI.
In midfield:
Yoel Barcenas (Mazatlan, Mexico)
Adalberto Carrasquilla (Houston Dynamo, MLS)
Christian Martinez (Al-Jandal, Saudi Arabia)
Michael Murillo (Marseille, France)
The other change from their 3-1 loss to Uruguay is up front, where Eduardo Guerrero (Zorya Luhansk, Ukraine) replaces Jose Fajardo.
Transfermarkt says Carrasquilla is the most valuable player on the team, at €4.5m. Murrillo is at €4m.
No player on the roster is based in Panama.
Preamble
The USA should beat Panama.
But Brazil should have beaten Costa Rica.
And Mexico should have beaten Venezuela.
A loss would leave the USA needing a result against Uruguay. That shouldn’t happen.
And I should stop using italics so much.
Kickoff in an hour-ish.
Beau will be here shortly. In the meantime, here’s how the US got on in their opener:
On 28 May 2016, Christian Pulisic became the youngest player to score for the US men’s national team, finding the net in a 4-0 win over Bolivia in a tune-up for the Copa América Centenario. But what happened the night before was, in a quieter way, no less notable.
Jürgen Klinsmann, then the US head coach, gave Pulisic permission to attend his high school prom in Hershey, Pennsylvania, the night before the match and the 17-year-old hired a private plane so he could make it back to Kansas City in time for the game.
That was the abnormal normal of his teenage years: the tension between the shy kid, a Justin Bieber fan who wanted to hang out with friends in a chocolate company town dubbed The Sweetest Place on Earth, and the reality of his work life as a soaring international starlet who travelled by executive jet before he was old enough to drive alone in Germany, where he lived. A universal rite of passage at his high school and a unique feat for his country, in the space of 24 hours.
You can read the full article below:
