USA at the World Cup

For a long time, I, along with many other American soccer fans, have been watching anxiously as the USA has gone through the qualification phase for the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Every American fan has been looking forward to putting the failure of the 2018 qualification campaign behind them, and to start anew with a young team looking to qualify for the world’s most important soccer tournament.

I actually think that in some ways the qualification process is just as, if not more, fun than the actual World Cup. This is mostly because there are more teams competing, and the qualification phase lasts longer. This makes for pretty interesting discussion. Therefore it was a lot of fun to see Canada master their qualification campaign, never losing a match. The USA also played well, beating out rivals Mexico at home, and playing well at Azteca Stadium in a scoreless draw.

The USA qualified on the final day, though not without losing their final match to Costa Rica, and finishing in third place, behind both Canada and Mexico. From there, the American team played in the CONCACAF Nations League in June, beating Grenada, and scoring late in El Salvador to earn a draw. Though these matches were not against teams that would be playing in the World Cup, the USA got an opportunity to play teams at that level in September, facing off against Japan and Saudi Arabia in a pair of friendly matches. Unfortunately, neither game was a success, with a loss to Japan and a draw against the Saudis being the final matches the team would play before playing in the World Cup. The hopes of American fans were slightly diminished heading into the all-important first match against Wales.

In that match, I rejoiced as I watched Christian Pulisic play a great ball in on goal for Timo Weah, who finished his chance and put us up 1-0 over the Welsh. I later despaired as I watched Gareth Bale convert a penalty kick to even the game up. We failed to close the door on the Welsh, and we left ourselves a lot of work to do to get out of the group phase, which was our goal.

In our second match, we faced a strong opponent in England. Oddly enough, because of the way the math worked out, it would not have been a big deal if we lost the match. Therefore I was surprised to see us put out our best players to start the match, and even more surprised to watch us play just as well as the English, if not better. It was a good feeling to avoid losing to England, keeping alive our streak of never losing to England in a FIFA World Cup.

Our final group match was Iran. It was win, or go home. Iran had beaten Wales in the final minutes of the match, and only needed a draw to advance. We would have to score a goal on a team that could afford to play as defensively as possible if they liked. It was a great game, with lots of energy and emotion. Christian Pulisic showed his quality and leadership, sacrificing his body to get the ball across the goal line and put us up 1-0 near the end of the first half. We were able to hold on, and beat Iran, advancing out of the group and on to the Round of 16.

The next match didn’t go so well. We were up against the Netherlands, a team that many saw as a weaker team than the likes of some of the best teams in the tournament. They were a pretty good side nonetheless. In the game against the Dutch, we seemed worn out after having fought hard for our advancement out of the group stage. We had our chances, but weren’t able to capitalize. The Netherlands punished us for defensive mistakes, and beat us 3-1.

I see a lot of Americans happy with our performance in the tournament, but talking about how we’re gunning for a semifinal finish or better in the 2026 World Cup, which we are co-hosting with Mexico and Canada. Personally, I’m not ready to talk about 2026 yet, and I think that we have a lot to be proud of in advancing out of our group, which is something plenty of teams failed to do, including every other team from North America, as well as some of the best teams in the tournament, such as Belgium, Germany, and Denmark.

This World Cup was a reassuring moment for the USA. We showed that we belong at the World Cup, and that we belong in the list of the best 16 teams in this tournament. Obviously, getting to the quarterfinals would have been amazing, but it is still gratifying to see us consistently getting to the Round of 16 (excluding 2018, when we didn’t qualify). There are a lot of reasons to look forward to the future of this team and of this sport in USA.