The USA close out their group stage in Inglewood | OneFootball

The first dead rubber of the 2026 FIFA World Cup took place on Thursday as the United States faced off against Türkiye in Inglewood, CA. The USA had wrapped up first place after beating Paraguay 4-1 and Australia 2-0, whilst Türkiye had been eliminated after losing 2-0 and 1-0 to Australia and Paraguay. But for a match that was effectively meaningless, there were plenty of feisty challenges on display throughout SoFi Stadium.

Turkish Media Brings the Passion

However, the first battle didn’t take place on the pitch, but on the first row of the press box, as a horde of Turkish journalists and officials belted out the lyrics to their country’s national anthem. An American representative came down and reminded them that this is, in fact, a neutral work environment. And when they cheered their country’s first World Cup goal since 2002, she reprimanded them once again, threatening to evict them from the premises.

But as she would soon come to find out, asking Turks to not be vocally exuberant about their national team is like asking a cheetah to slowly amble down the savannah rather than sprinting at breakneck pace and chasing down their prey. They didn’t care if they were going home on Friday: they weren’t going to back down without a fight.

Poch Plays it Safe

USMNT manager Mauricio Pochettino understood the assignment: he knew that rotating his starting core was far more essential than making it three wins from three in the group stage. It’s why he went with a second-choice XI, apart from Weston McKennie. McKennie started in place of backup midfielder Cristian Roldan, who was nursing a quadriceps strain.

“[My body feels] better every day…hopefully I get the chance to progress in my training sessions over the next couple of days and give myself a chance to feature in the game,” stated Roldan to Hooligan Soccer.

Bright Start; Dim Finish

Just as they did on Matchday 1 and 2, the USA got off to a perfect start as Sebastian Berhalter played a corner kick towards the far post, where Auston Trusty was there to control and slot home the opening goal.

But when it seemed that the USMNT would be taking the momentum, Türkiye immediately responded with a superb passing combination, with Arda Güler putting the finishing touches.

After 63 shots, Türkiye finally had their goal.

The half remained high-octane from start to finish, with tackles flying in constantly. Berhalter was given a yellow for a studs-up tackle on Salih Özcan. This merely added fuel to the Crescent-Stars’ fire, with Güler linking up with Kenan Yıldız and playing in the overlapping Orkun Kökçü, whose cross was tipped in by Barış Alper Yılmaz for the go-ahead goal.

Second Half Summary

Whilst the USA came close to equalizing before the break, they didn’t find their equalizer until after the interval as Mark McKenzie’s long throw-in bobbled around the box and made its way towards Berhalter, who watched it to perfection and stayed on top of it before striking with his laces and firing a long-range firecracker into the back of the net.

Sensing that the victory was there for the taking, Pochettino decided to bring on Christian Pulisic for his first minutes since the first half against Paraguay, removing a decidedly unimpressive Timothy Weah. “I think I played a horrible game today,” stated Weah to Hooligan Soccer. “I’m disappointed in myself. My team played well, and there were some moments where Türkiye obviously came out a bit aggressive, and I think we managed to come back and then they scored the late goal.”

“I think my teammates did an amazing job, but from a personal level, I think I played a horrible game. It was just one of those days where nothing worked for me. I’m proud of my team and what we’ve done to get to this position. We’re playing Bosnia next, so now it’s time to refocus and get back into training and work hard…I know against Bosnia it’s going to be positive.”

In stark contrast to Weah, Pulisic immediately showcased his quality both in terms of his incisive runs in behind as well as his superb finishing ability, with the Milan man having at least three opportunities to test Uğurcan Çakır. But ultimately, he was narrowly denied on each occasion, with Türkiye managing to ride the storm out.

Substitutions & Last Second Heroics

Pochettino made a triple substitution with a quarter-hour left, with starters Sergiño Dest and Alex Freeman coming on for Giovanni Reyna and Joe Scally, whilst Alejandro Zendejas replaced fellow squad player Brenden Aaronson. Vincenzo Montella would respond with two subs of his own, with Çağlar Söyüncü and Can Uzun replacing Yıldız and Zeki Çelik, to which Pochettino retorted by subbing on Tillman for McKennie.

Three more substitutions would follow in the final minutes as Kaan Ayhan replaced Kökçü, whilst Mert Müldür and İrfan Can Kahveci replaced Oğuz Aydın and Yılmaz. It seemed as if the two sides would share a point until the very final second as Türkiye coolly shuffled the ball around the box before finding Özcan, who clipped it in for Uzun to cross to Ayhan, who slammed home the winning goal.

Measured Reactions from US

“I think obviously the fact that we lost is disappointing,” stated USMNT left back Antonee Robinson to Hooligan Soccer. “We would have loved to have swept the group and gone through on a real high, but fortunately we managed to take care of business early, and that gave us a chance to rest players and rotate the team a little bit.”

“[In terms of the lessons we learned], don’t take it too easy on anyone. Obviously, this game was more or less for nothing…I think the result wasn’t important, but the way we played wasn’t enough today,” stated USMNT midfielder Malik Tillman.

“I would say [the main positive] is just the competitive nature of it. I think it was a high-intensity game, and with that, we can replicate that going forward into the next round,” began USMNT left back Max Arfsten. “That’s one thing we can take away from it.”

“Losing is disappointing, it always is, but I think once we get our heads around that tonight and analyze the game and see things that we could’ve improved upon, it’s still going to be an incredibly positive feeling that we’ve won the group,” added Robinson. “Going into Bosnia, we’ll be full of confidence.”

Joe Scally, meanwhile, seemed similarly nonchalant about the defeat: “There’s a lot of positives, we created a lot of chances, we gave up a lot of unfortunate goals,” stated Scally to Hooligan Soccer. “But overall, we’re happy, everyone’s healthy, and we’re going through to the next round. We respect everyone, we know Bosnia have a good team, and while we just finished the match vs. Türkiye, we’ll focus on them during the week.”

Match Takeaways

Türkiye had prevailed with their first World Cup victory since 2002, when they edged South Korea in the bronze medal match, and the Turkish journalists roared their approval in one final act of defiance. But as for the United States, they’re focused on the next task at hand: a date with Bosnia & Herzegovina in Santa Clara on July 1.

Whilst it may have been the USA’s first defeat of the tournament, it was still a victory in many ways. It was a chance for the USMNT’s starters to take a breather, and it was also a chance for substitutes like Berhalter to showcase their quality. Ultimately, this is a marathon and not a sprint, and the USA know better than anyone that you can’t win the World Cup in the group stage, but you can lose it in the group stage.

“[The silver lining] is the fact that we got a lot of minutes from guys who maybe haven’t contributed as much as they’d have wanted to,” stated Chris Richards to Hooligan Soccer. “Christian [Pulisic] coming on and having a good game was also very important for us and for him. Overall, it’s just good to have team morale regardless of the result, just having guys on the pitch.”