By Official Florida FC
The USMNT advanced to the CONCACAF Nations League semifinals with a 1-0 win over El Salvador on Monday night in Orlando. The win helped the USMNT improve to 6-0-0 all time at Exploria Stadium.
The match was the first genuine test for the program since it lost in the Round of 16 in the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Here were our thoughts from spending 90 minutes on the touchline.
Pepi train should have been on the plane
Ricardo Pepi scored his sixth international goal with a composed chip over El Salvador’s Mario Gonzalez within two minutes of coming onto the pitch.
“We as a staff we really value him,” said USMNT interim head coach Anthony Hudson. “We love him as a person…He’s had a good week. I’m really pleased he’s come in and taken his chances. To be fair, in both games, he (could have) had quite of few more goals.”
Pepi is 20 years old. He has six goals and three assists in 14 appearances for the full U.S. men’s national team. Though he scored three of those goals this window, against Grenada and El Salvador, he showed in World Cup qualifying that he merited a place on the World Cup squad.
The USMNT scored three goals in four games at the World Cup.
In November, the program kicked off an elimination match with a forward who had not scored for his country in three full years. Days later, it tried to find three goals in 30 minutes with a different center forward who had never scored an outfield goal for the USMNT.
Pepi has the size, the skill and the hold-up play to be the center forward for the present and the future. Leaving him home was a mistake that future coaches should not soon emulate.
Sluggish starts need to end
The USMNT started Monday’s match with seven of the 11 players who were mainstays for the program in the 2022 World Cup.
With so many familiar faces, as well as talented attackers Gio Reyna and Alex Zendejas, in the starting XI, the USMNT had no excuse for another slow start.
The program had a tendency to start slow in World Cup qualifying and also did son in two of its four World Cup matches. It’s one thing to take time to settle against Iran in a must-win match or the Netherlands in the Round of 16, it’s another to do so against an El Salvador squad that finished sixth in the CONCACAF Octagonal.
“The first half, I don’t think we were – all of us coaching staff included – I don’t think we set the team up in a way that helped them in the first half,” Hudson said. “We made a couple changes where it helped the team.”
El Salvador forced USMNT goalkeeper Matt Turner into a second-minute save. Later in the first half, it nearly broke through the middle of the USMNT defense with long punts from goalkeeper Mario Gonzalez directly to center forward Brayan Gil who was making his full international debut.
“They are a tough team to play against,” Hudson said of the visitors. “The coach has a very clear plan for how his team play. They made it very difficult for us.”
El Salvador can be difficult to beat at times – don’t let the eight losses in the Octagonal deceive – but, teams that have aspirations of competing in the business end of a World Cup should not have difficulty against them.
Adams was missed
Tyler Adams is the deserved captain of the USMNT. The Leeds United midfielder provides leadership, energy and can operate as a single pivot. Without him, the USMNT often must rely on a double pivot in the midfield. It’s a tweak that makes the team less fluid going forward.
Weston McKennie and Yunus Musah were the double pivots against El Salvador. Interim head coach Anthony Hudson said McKennie, Adams’ teammate for club and country, had a good game, but was battling some type of illness.
With Reyna starting in what appeared to be a No. 10 role, it left a massive gap between the double pivots and the most advanced midfielder. El Salvador didn’t have the quality to exploit it, but teams with more attacking talent will.
