Short on Style, U.S. Men Win
The 36,044 fans who showed up at the Orange Bowl Wednesday night for a Gold Cup doubleheader were treated to both sides of the soccer coin.
The first was as bright and shiny as a new penny, a sparkling 2-0 victory by tournament upstart Honduras over a curiously uninspired Colombia.
The second was dull and worn, a game without a face for most of its 90 minutes. It ended with the United States defeating Peru, 1-0, in an encounter deserted by half the fans long before it was over.
Those who left missed a fine goal engineered by one former UCLA player and scored by another. They also missed two superb saves by a third former Bruin.
In the 59th minute, Eddie Lewis raced down the left flank and then suddenly stopped. His defender, Roberto Holsen, rushed on by, and before he could recover Lewis had time to cross the ball right-footed into the goal area.
There, the Galaxy’s Cobi Jones soared above Peruvian defender Marci al Orbe Salazar and headed the ball powerfully past goalkeeper Oscar Ibanez to give the U.S. a barely deserved lead.
“Eddie put the ball in and I just went up for the header and tried to deflect it to the far post and I caught the keeper [napping],” Jones said.
Six minutes later, Peru came within a whisker of tying it. A fierce, ground-hugging shot by Ysrael Zuniga from close range was smothered by Brad Friedel in front of the U.S. net.
Friedel again came through seven minutes later when he threw himself low to his left and made a one-handed block on a searing shot by Abel Lobaton.
Asked afterward if he thought either of the shots might get by him, Friedel laughed. “If I thought that, then I probably wouldn’t be playing,” he said.
From then on the U.S. hung onto its victory, helped by the fact that Peru had to play the final 13 minutes without one player after Zuniga was ejected with his second yellow card.
The twin results mean the U.S. will play Colombia, and Honduras will play Peru, in Saturday’s quarterfinals. The winners of those games will advance to a semifinal at San Diego’s Qualcomm Stadium at 8 p.m. on Feb. 23.
Considering the key roles played by Westwood alumni Lewis, Jones and Friedel in the victory, it was UCLA that beat Peru, Jones was told.
“I guess you could look at it that way,” he said.
Bruce Arena, the U.S. coach and a former University of Virginia coach, was asked, tongue-in-cheek, if it was a little galling to be relying so heavily on ex-Bruins. “I couldn’t care where they come from,” Arena said. “They could be from Duke, for all I care.”
The evening’s first game produced an even tussle through the first 45 minutes. Honduras took charge in the second half, cheered on by what had to be at least 15,000 blue-and-white-clad fans in the crowd.
The first goal came with 19:42 left to play when midfielder Amado Guevara sent a perfect through pass to Carlos Pavon and the Honduran captain fired a low shot past Colombian goalkeeper Miguel Calero.
With its fans cheering for more--victories by Central American teams over their South American rivals are relatively rare--Honduras obliged. Seven minutes after the first goal, it doubled its advantage.
This time, Pavon provided the pass, lifting a cross from the right wing into the goal area for Milton Nunez to head past Calero from close range.
The result left Arena with the prematch knowledge that a loss to Peru would mean facing the red-hot Hondurans in Saturday’s quarterfinals. A victory or a tie, on the other hand, would mean facing an unhappy Colombia intent on redeeming its reputation.
A no-win situation? Not really.
“I don’t think we can ever afford to approach a game and not try to win,” Arena said the day before the Peru victory. “We don’t have that luxury. We’re not going to horse around and say, ‘Let’s just get a point’ [from a tie] because we prefer to play this team or that team. I think we’re just going to go out and try to win the game.
“That’s still important for us at this point in time. Anytime we step on the field, we still try to win.”
To that end, Arena made several changes in his starting lineup from the team that defeated Haiti, 3-0, in the opening game last Saturday.
Most dramatically, he replaced his entire defense, giving Jeff Agoos, Robin Fraser and C.J. Brown a rest and starting Greg Vanney, Eddie Pope and Carlos Llamosa in their place.
Jones moved from the forward line back out to the right wing, replacing Ben Olsen, and Brian McBride returned at striker in Jones’ place.
The Americans started out brightly, with a string of passes exchanged between Jovan Kirovski, Claudio Reyna, Eric Wynalda, McBride and Jones. But the move foundered.
The closest the U.S. came to scoring in the first half was when Jones cut a pass in from the right wing, but McBride’s sliding lunge at the ball was seconds late and his shot went wide right.
In the end, though, Jones managed to score and keep the U.S. unbeaten in 2000. In doing so, he extended his personal streak of getting a goal or an assist to four consecutive games. Jones, who also scored against Chile and Haiti, is also the first U.S. player to score in three consecutive games since Willy Roy in 1972.
