United States star player Christian Pulisic perhaps said it best after the team dropped its World Cup Group D finale in dramatic last-kick fashion to Turkey in a game that meant very little to the Stars and Stripes.
Pulisic responded with some straight talk when asked what was being said in the locker room on Thursday after the 3–2 loss in Los Angeles: “Not a lot right now. Obviously a little bit of disappointment at the result, but all in all, positivity. Just to stick together, really, is the main focus. We still have the big games ahead of us.
“It’s just time to regroup, recover, and get ready for the next one,” Pulisic told reporters after the game, in which the Turkish were playing for pride only after being eliminated from knockout-stage contention with two losses and no goals scored in its first two matches.
Pulisic was cordial. Manager Mauricio Pochettino approached the match like a practice game and the postgame press conference like a title bout. The U.S. side had already locked up the top spot in the group to advance to the knockout round long before the first kick against the Turkish.
Four members of Pochettino’s side were on yellow cards—Folarin Balogun, Tyler Adams, Chris Richards, and Antonee Robinson—and Pochettino opted to keep them on the sideline, along with five others, whom he rested.
Pochettino, in his less-than-perfect English, quickly grew weary of inquiries about his lineup for a game of little consequence and sounded off early on into his press conference.
“If you explain what means momentum—that topic is a topic I don’t understand momentum,” Pochettino shot back after a question about the team losing some of its mojo and perhaps some of the public confidence that the side can make a run beyond the Round of 32.
The Argentine focused on the fact that the lineup was much different and the realization that putting players with a yellow card in jeopardy of being issued another caution would mean they would have to miss a match.
Pochettino made it clear that he didn’t want “to risk [a player receiving] a yellow card and not to play the next game,” and also said he held others out because of “circumstances.”
He then balked at the notion that a win in the group finale would carry over to the next match.
“I don’t understand the momentum. Germany lose the momentum, too?” he questioned about the Germans, who fell 2–1 in their Group E finale to Ecuador the same day.
It’s true that Pochettino sent out his reserves to take over when the United States could possibly make some history on home soil—the country was trying to win its third consecutive World Cup match for the first time—but the bigger goal had already been accomplished. So Pochettino criticized the media for failing to recognize the team for carrying out its objective and advancing.
“I am so positive and I am happy,” he said. “Maybe I am not showing because your question is a little bit weird, but I am so happy and the players are happy because I think we performed. We compete and we are first.”
He even remarked that when he arrived for the press conference, he was “confused because maybe the mood or the vibes is like we go home tonight and Turkey stays, no?” he said.
Instead of his side earning praise for a game in which its reserves fought back from a goal down and tied the score at 2–2 early in the second half, Pochettino grew increasingly frustrated that “no one congratulated us [for finishing] first in a very difficult group” as he went on a rant to close out the media session.
“I’m sorry, guys. It cannot be possible that Turkey is celebrating the three points and Australia is celebrating the qualification. Paraguay celebrating the qualification, and [to] come here and for you not to say congratulations that we won the group, that is a little bit sad.
“But only that I need to [remind] you, and everyone, that we won the group. Sorry, guys, we won.”
Now, the “big games,” just as Pulisic said, are on the horizon. The U.S. side takes on Bosnia-Herzegovina in the Round of 32 on Wednesday in Santa Clara, California.
The Americans haven’t won a knockout-stage match since the 2002 World Cup when a much-different U.S. team defeated Mexico 2–0 in the Round of 16.
FIFA has the Stars and Stripes team ranked No. 15 in the world, while the Bosnia-Herzegovina side is at No. 61. The European team was third in its group, notching one victory, one draw, and a loss.
The expectations will be ramped up again for a U.S. team that has historically been mediocre in World Cup play.
If the players follow Pochettino’s feisty lead, they will certainly be ready to take their shots.
