USA "ready to battle" Bosnia & Herzegovina in World Cup Round of 32 | OneFootball

By Charles Boehm

SANTA CLARA, Calif. – There’s no sporting stage quite as big as the FIFA World Cup. And once you’ve reached it, there’s no tension quite like the tournament’s knockout stages.

Every touch takes on extra significance. Every play could become a life-changing moment. Every mistake could be the one that stunts your team’s dreams.

That’s the pressure cooker the United States step into when they face Bosnia and Herzegovina in Wednesday night’s Round of 32 clash at the hulking home of the San Francisco 49ers, dubbed San Francisco Bay Area Stadium for this summer's event (8 pm ET | FOX, Telemundo, Peacock).

“We understand what it means. You win or you go home,” star attacker Christian Pulisic said Tuesday morning as the Yanks held their final pregame training session at the San Jose Earthquakes’ PayPal Park.

“Definitely needs to be a lot of focus and attention to detail this week. But I think the vibe feels good. We've still kept it light, and we still are going to be ready to battle once the whistle blows.”

Knockout test

After emphatic wins over Paraguay and Australia clinched first place in Group D with a game to spare, the USMNT had the rare luxury of throttling back a bit against Türkiye, rotating nine of their starting XI to rest and protect those carrying heavy mileage and/or yellow cards in what eventually turned out to be a last-second 3-2 loss to an already-eliminated side.

Since then, head coach Mauricio Pochettino and his players have repeatedly dismissed the idea that doing so robbed them of momentum. Now they must prove as much against Bosnia and Herzegovina, a tenacious adversary with a growing list of upsets to their credit, most prominently UEFA qualification playoff shocks over Wales and Italy.

Should they win, they'll move on to the Round of 16 and meet Belgium or Senegal on July 6 in Seattle. A loss dashes their tournament dreams.

“Bosnia is a very combative and aggressive, physical team,” said Pochettino in his pregame press conference, “but also they have good organization, good coach, really good coach, in the way that you see the games they play in the Group Stage, or the qualification in March against Italy. You can see that they have quality, not only that they are aggressive or good organization, they have players with quality and a coach that provide the platform to perform.

“That is why, for us, this is the final of the World Cup tomorrow. If we don't think in this way, I think we are going to struggle.”

Esmir returns

The Dragons already know what it means to square off with a host nation, having held Canada to a 1-1 draw in Toronto during their 2026 World Cup opener.

They possess creativity in young wingers Kerim Alajbegović and Esmir Bajraktarević, the latter a dual-national son of Bosnian refugees who grew up in Wisconsin and made his breakout in MLS as a New England Revolution homegrown, then earned a reported $6 million transfer to Dutch power PSV Eindhoven.

“He’s a classic example of what’s happening lately since I’ve been here. We’ve expanded our horizons all the way to the US,” Bosnia manager Sergej Barbarez said of Bajraktarević, who earned a January-camp cap with the USMNT before switching allegiance to his ancestral homeland.

“Esmir is a very good guy. He’s a nice, extremely well-mannered guy who knows why he’s here. He can feel the jersey; he’s inspired.

“This touch of American culture is very important, because we have guys from all over the world, who were born all over the world. This is a big advantage for us, that we have brought all these cultures and nationalities into one unit.”

Dynamic duo

Up top, Bosnia are led by the burly strike duo of Edin Džeko – at age 40, a national icon with massive experience across the English Premier League, Italy’s Serie A and the German Bundesliga – and Ermedin Demirović of Stuttgart.

“Facing Bosnia presents a challenge; they play with two physically imposing forwards who are excellent at holding up the ball and playing off long balls and second balls,” said Pochettino in Spanish.

“It is crucial for our two center backs to contain those strikers. We’ve been working on that, knowing that Bosnia is a difficult opponent, especially with their dynamic players arriving from the second line and wingers who cross the ball very well. Those crosses are dangerous because they have players who are strong in the air.”

Cautionary tale

The first two matchdays of the Round of 32 served up suspense and surprises, with Paraguay upsetting Germany and Morocco knocking off the Netherlands, both via gripping penalty-kick shootouts on Monday, and Canada’s late heroics to edge South Africa inspiring their nation on Sunday.

That all represents both possibility and peril for the US, whose 4-1 rout of Paraguay in their opening match looks that much more impressive after La Albirroja stifled a four-time world champion.

“In the moment you're a fan, and then afterwards you realize that this is also the same tournament that we're playing in. I think it's a weird dynamic,” said FC Dallas product Chris Richards of the European elites’ shock elimination. “It's making sure that we don't allow that to happen to us.

“It's our chance to go farther in this tournament,” Richards added. “Now we've seen two big boys fall, so it's just a matter of us getting through this game and playing a good performance, and hopefully we continue that … It's starting to open up, so it's very exciting for us.”

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