ST. LOUIS — U.S. men’s national team defender Chris Richards didn’t hesitate when asked if he wanted to face Mexico in the Concacaf Gold Cup final.
It was only an hour after the U.S. had outlasted Guatemala 2-1 in Wednesday’s semifinal. But Richards was upfront about wanting to face the Americans’ historic nemesis in Sunday’s grand finale in Houston (coverage begins at 6 p.m. ET on FOX).
Mexico was still locked in a scoreless battle with Honduras halfway across the country at that point. It would’ve been easy for Richards to hedge.
He didn’t.
“Yeah,” Richards said. “Yeah, I do.”
“We owe them a little something from the October camp,” Richards added, alluding to Mexico’s 2-0 win in Guadalajara last fall that snapped a seven-game winless run against the Americans. “We’ll do it by winning a trophy.”
He and his USMNT teammates got their wish. Mexico went on to defeat Honduras 1-0 in Santa Clara, California, and advance to Sunday’s championship. It promises to be a sold-out crowd of more than 70,000 mostly green-clad fans at NRG Stadium, home of the NFL’s Houston Texans.
“Growing up seeing the USA-Mexico games, to be able to play in one would be unreal,” said U.S. forward Diego Luna, a Mexican-American who scored both goals against Guatemala.
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The atmosphere on Sunday will be off the charts. But Wednesday’s match was the ideal dress rehearsal for coach Mauricio Pochettino’s squad, who were the home team only in name at Energizer Park. Most of the 22,000 there were rooting for the Guatemalans, who hadn’t made it to the Gold Cup semifinal round in almost three decades. The noise inside the stadium was deafening for most of the contest. It made for an unforgettable spectacle, with the emotion from the stands spurring on both sides.
“It’s so intense,” said St. Louis native Tim Ream, who captained his country for the 20th occasion on Wednesday, tying him with program legend Clint Dempsey for 11th on the all-time list. “It adds more to the game, adds more pressure.”
Tim Ream understands the pressure of playing in intense Gold Cup games. (Photo by Bill Barrett/ISI Photos/USSF/Getty Images)
And for the most part, the Americans dealt with it well. Both of Luna’s goals came inside the first 15 minutes of the contest, which helped take the air out of the building — at least for a while. But Los Chapines soon got their supporters back in the game and probably had the better of the play the rest of the way.
“They had nothing to lose,” said Ream. “They’re down 2-0 after 15 minutes and they can go all-out, because they have to find a way back into the game.”
By the time it was over, the visitors had kept 51 percent of possession and out-shot the U.S. 20-12, finally beating keeper Matt Freese on Olger Escobar’s strike that made the final 10 minutes excruciating for the USMNT backers in the house.
Still, Pochettino’s team found a way to survive. Those lessons could prove invaluable this weekend and, with the 2026 World Cup on home soil less than a year away, beyond.
“This game tonight would be like the little brother to the U.S.-Mexico game,” Richards said. “If they were a bit nervous for that one, the next line is going to be a lot bigger…it was really important for some of the younger guys to experience that.”
As grizzled Concacaf veterans, Ream and Richards weren’t surprised that the U.S. was basically the away team at home. It’s been the case for U.S. teams going back decades when they come up against rival countries where soccer is regarded as more religion than sport. It was a new experience for the many youngsters on this roster, which is missing about a dozen regulars this summer, including AC Milan star and USMNT headliner Christian Pulisic.
“Growing up seeing the USA-Mexico games, to be able to play in one would be unreal”
— U.S. men’s team star Diego Luna
But it surely surprised some of the youngsters. It was an eye-opener for Pochettino, too.
“Unbelievable, the fans of Guatemala,” the coach said. “It was an atmosphere that we did not expect.”
“That is Concacaf,” Ream said. “You’re playing in the heart of the heart of America and you have 95 percent Guatemalan fans.
“You have to embrace it,” he continued. “You have to enjoy it.”
Luna certainly did.
“I loved it,” he said. “That’s what every game should be like.”
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The next one will be several orders of magnitude bigger. But this young U.S. team has shown plenty of resilience in its last two games, including last Sunday’s penalty shootout win over Costa Rica in the quarterfinals. And this squad has earned the right to play on the biggest stage there is in this corner of Planet Fútbol.
Few would’ve predicted a U.S.-Mexico decider at the start of the tournament, which the Americans entered on the back of a four-match losing streak — their longest run of futility since 2007. Now they are just one more victory away from their eighth Gold Cup title.
“We’re onto a final, a final that I’d say a month ago, everyone basically counted us out of,” Ream said. “Shame on them.”
The U.S. men’s team are onto the Gold Cup final on Sunday. (Photo by Bill Barrett/ISI Photos/USSF/Getty Images)
Whether or not they prevail, the U.S. will be ready.
“It’s new for a lot of guys to play in environments like this – that’s something we can build off,” Luna said.
“This is a great example for what’s to come on Sunday.”
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