U.S. Bruised in a Cruise
Some victories come at a high cost--just ask Chris Armas--and the United States almost had to foot the bill once again on Thursday night.
Continuing its preparatory march toward the World Cup, the American team easily brushed aside Jamaica, beating the Reggae Boyz, 5-0, in front of 30,659 fans at Giants Stadium.
Far more important than the result, however, was the cost of the victory. Or at least what it might have cost had things turned out any worse. A brief accounting:
* Defender Greg Vanney left at the end of the first half after spraining his right knee.
* Goalkeeper Kasey Keller limped off after 53 minutes with a badly bruised left knee sustained in a collision with Jamaican forward Deon Burton.
* Striker Clint Mathis played less than 18 minutes as a second-half substitute before injuring the big toe on his right foot. He later had half the nail cut off.
Each injury brought to mind Sunday, when the luckless Armas tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee during a 2-1 victory over Uruguay in Washington, D.C. The injury knocked the Chicago Fire midfielder out of the World Cup.
Bruce Arena, the U.S. coach, dismissed the latest batch of injuries as nothing serious.
“We don’t think there’s anything severe there,” he said. “Keller’s is a bruised knee, Mathis just got stepped on, and Vanney has a slight sprain.”
The loss of any of the players would have been a serious blow to the U.S. Keller, for instance, is battling Brad Friedel for the starting job in goal. As it is, when he came off it gave No. 3 keeper Tony Meola the chance to earn his 99th cap for the national team.
“I thought I could shake it off, but it wasn’t going to happen so I thought I’d get some ice on it as quickly as possible,” Keller said of the injury he incurred when he and Burton went for the ball and smacked into each other. “If it had been a World Cup game, I don’t know if I would have come off.
“It doesn’t feel very good right now, but I’ll keep my fingers crossed. It could just be a little bone bruise. We’ll see how it feels tomorrow and go from there.”
The U.S. controlled the game throughout, playing at a fast pace and keeping Jamaica off balance. Arena started only one of the players (Earnie Stewart) who had started against Uruguay and ended up using 18 in all.
Josh Wolff scored the first of his two goals in the 32nd minute to give the U.S. a 1-0 lead at the half. Mathis was one of four substitutes used by Arena in the second 45 minutes and it took him only 1:47 to score his sixth goal.
Wolff added another in the 60th minute, and it was left to youngsters Landon Donovan and DaMarcus Beasley to complete the scoring in the final six minutes, with Eddie Lewis assisting on both goals.
“Obviously, I think we played well tonight,” said Arena, who overtook Bora Milutinovic and became the all-time leader in coaching victories for the U.S. with 31.
“I think our fitness level showed. The first half of the game was played at a pretty high pace and I think we wore them out a little bit.”
In the second game of the doubleheader, the New York/New Jersey MetroStars tied AC Milan of Italy, 1-1, with Jose Mari Romero-Poyon scoring for the Italian club and Tab Ramos tying it for the MetroStars.
