Legends don’t miss multiple penalties on the biggest stage. If he made that first one, perhaps they’re in the Quarters…
Going back to the USMNT, this reminds me: I'm more and more sure that Wondo only draws the level of vitriol from USMNT fans that he does because he was a career MLS player. We generated more chances against England this year than against Belgium in 2014. McKennie even missed an easier chance: unmarked near the penalty spot with the keeper already off balance. Wondo had a narrower angle to shoot at, with a keeper rushing out at him. But instead all the criticism related to the England match is directed at Berhalter for not putting players in position to score. I get that the situation was also different, with Wondo blowing a chance to score a late winner in a knockout match. But it's taken as an article of faith that Wondo's chance should have been an easy goal, while we apparently failed to create scoring chances against England, never mind that we had the best one for both teams.
So, if we pencil England into the quarters... we've got England vs France, Argentina vs the Netherlands, and we could be looking at Portugal vs Spain. This is going to make for some fun viewing.
If Jesus Ferera had the missed opportunity at the beginning of the game rather than Pulisic, it would be talked about a lot more. I think it will be interesting to see what happens in 15-20 years if MLS becomes a top 5/6 league in the world. Over the last year, I took in some games in Portugal ad Scotland. Outside of the big teams, MLS is just as good if not better. What do you blame then?
Just an FYI...I'm going to use these figures in a USMNT thread. Those mis-informed zealots won't believe these numbers, but it'll at least give me a few laughs.
Some on Facebook have already blamed Berhalter's preference for MLS players and/or the "MLS quota" for Reyna not starting or not getting enough minutes. Only thing is... no MLS players started any games at any position Reyna plays. The only MLS player who got more minutes than Reyna was Walker Zimmeman. The three MLS players who were potentially competing with him for minutes were Morris, Ferreira, and Roldan -- Reyna played more minutes than all three combined.