The United States defeated Australia in an important group match at the World Cup. The 2-0 victory means the U.S. will advance to the tournament’s knockout round.
MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
The U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team defeated Australia at the World Cup today. In a raucous game played in Seattle, the Americans won 2-nil. That victory also assures the U.S. team will advance to the knockout round later this month. NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan was at that raucous game. She joins us now from outside the stadium. Hey, Beck.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: Hello. I’m sure you can tell that that’s where I am right now.
KELLY: Yes, you sound like you’re somewhere outside a stadium. And I am insanely jealous. Tell me more about the game.
SULLIVAN: Yeah, you know what? There was a lot of hype for this game because much had been made before the match of the quality of this Australian team. They had shocked Turkey 2 to 0 in their first game of this World Cup. And so the U.S. was saying that they were taking this opponent really seriously. But it was the Americans who controlled the match really from the get-go. They scored in the 11th minute on an own goal that came out of this aggressive run by the U.S. forward Folarin Balogun. They added another goal just before halftime. That was when the defender Alex Freeman knocked in a header.
You know, Australia just really had no answers. The U.S. played – was able to play more defensively in the second half. They shut them out, and just, you know, a tremendous performance, this continuation of this really fluid offense that we’d seen from the U.S. in the first game. They now have six total goals in this World Cup, which is nothing to see sad and (ph) really sets them up well for the final group stage match, which is next Thursday.
KELLY: Well, and this performance today feels particularly remarkable because the U.S. team was down their biggest star, right?
SULLIVAN: Yeah, exactly. That’s Christian Pulisic. That’s their left winger. He is, you know, I think a lot of people would agree the best player on the team. He is the active all-time leading scorer for the U.S. He has had a nagging injury, though, to his left calf that was exacerbated in the game last week against Paraguay, when he was kicked in the leg by a Paraguayan player, had to come out at half time. And so, all week, he’d been training individually instead of with the team, but it still really wasn’t clear how serious the injury was. Unfortunately, we now see that it was pretty serious. I mean, if you can’t play a game in the World Cup, that’s serious. And it’s a huge deal, obviously, because he’s a key contributor. They made it through this game, but I’m sure all of those guys are hoping he’ll be back next week.
KELLY: Yeah. So that must raise some big question marks for the team moving forward.
SULLIVAN: Yup.
KELLY: You said that the next big game is against Turkey. How are they going to look if he can’t play?
SULLIVAN: Yeah, so what they did today is they started in his place a forward named Ricardo Pepi. He is making his World Cup debut this summer. And they looked good, I got to say. I mean, so Ricardo Pepi was playing up on that left side. They were able to move the ball up well without him. You had players like Antonee Robinson, Ricardo Pepi, Weston McKennie, Malik Tillman who are all instrumental in getting the ball upward, moving it up, creating those chances up at the top that Pulisic is so central to. That said, Turkey theoretically has more talent on paper than Australia. They have some really good players…
KELLY: Yeah.
SULLIVAN: …In Europe’s top leagues. So they’ll want Pulisic back, that’s for sure.
KELLY: We can still hear a little bit of the raucousness unfolding behind you. Just tell me more about the home…
SULLIVAN: Yeah.
KELLY: …Atmosphere at this game.
SULLIVAN: I mean, this is in Seattle. This is a big-time soccer town. They are consistently among the highest attendance for teams in the MLS. And they played the game at the NFL stadium, Lumen Field. It’s right near downtown. It’s an insane environment. And so no surprise it really showed out. The attendance announced during the game was 66,925. That, of course, was a sell out. Most of those were U.S. fans cheering very hard a lot in that first half, but there was also a really good crowd of Australians who were singing “Waltzing Matilda” early in the game.
KELLY: Great.
SULLIVAN: So you have to love that.
KELLY: Right.
SULLIVAN: And I think with the U.S. headed back to LA next week, we’ll see more of the same there.
KELLY: All right. That’s NPR’s Becky Sullivan in Seattle, where the U.S. team is celebrating a 2-nil win. Thank you, Becky.
SULLIVAN: Of course. Thank you.
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