Floridian Jonathan Lewis makes substitute appearance in Americans’ 1-0 win


Its been a quarter century since English pundit Alan Hansen quipped “you can’t win anything with kids.”

Hansen was referencing a Manchester United side that would eventually go on to win the English Premier League nine months later. His memorable line may describe how some may have felt when the United States men’s national team’s first starting XI of 2020 was unveiled.

Saturday afternoon in Carson, Calif. the USMNT beat Costa Rica with a starting XI that averaged 23 years, 216 days. In all, seven players who appeared in the win over Los Ticos made their USMNT debut Saturday. Four of the debutants —. Jesus Ferriera, Sam Vines, Brenden Aaronson and Ulysses Llanez — were in the starting XI.

Paul Arriola, a 24-year-old winger, was the most-capped player in the lineup with 33 appearances.

Llanez, an 18-year-old forward who plays for Wolfsburg’s U-19 team in Germany, scored the only goal of the match in the 50th minute. He was lively and active at forward; but, it’s impossible to make grand takeaways from one’s debut.

Plantation resident Jonathan Lewis replaced Llanez in the 73rd minute. Lewis earned his sixth cap for the USMNT. The 22-year-old winger has primarily served as a super sub for the national team.

Lewis made his international debut on Feb. 2, 2019 in a 2-0 win over Costa Rica. His appearance in Saturday’s win leads to an inevitable question: Which players used Saturday’s friendly as a springboard to a career with the U.S. men’s national team.

If we include Lewis, the U.S. men’s national team has been able to uncover a contributor to the program in each of its last seven January camps.

The youth and inexperience of the lineup was to be expected considering Saturday’s game was outside of a FIFA international window. The U.S. Soccer Federation has used its January camp and friendly to introduce new players into the national team.

Some like Zack Steffan (2018) are sure-fire starters. Others like Kellyn Acosta (2016) and Matt Besler (2013) remain in the USMNT player pool, but are not frequently called up to the national team. Then there are players such as Sebastian Lletget (2017), Wil Trap (2015) and DeAndre Yedlin (2014) who are squad members and occasionally asked to start a match.

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