RIO DE JANEIRO — Forget about that last goal. Pretend it never happened, as if that soccer ball never ricocheted off the head of a perfectly positioned Portuguese player and into the United States’ net. Do not dwell on those last 30 seconds of that game on Sunday night in the Amazon that stomped on the throat of an otherwise sublime night.
Emotions are hard to temper at a time like this — when a surprising American victory seemed all but guaranteed, until that header suddenly proved that it wasn’t — but the broader picture is not at all bleak. Even after tying Portugal, 2-2, the United States remains on a trajectory for the Round of 16 in this World Cup. On an evening that was hard to take, there still should have been some cheers heard Sunday among the whimpers.
These are the same 23 players whom few expected to emerge out of Group G, which some have called the Group of Death. When the draw was held in December, many expected the United States to be in last place after two games, already packing its red-white-and-blue duffel bags and booking their flights home.
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But while the faces of the players — and their fans — did not have much color after Sunday’s tie, there is still much life left in this team. If the Americans beat Germany on Thursday, or even if they tie, they will advance out of the Group of Death. Even if they lose, they can still make it out of this round if Ghana ties with Portugal, or if the margin of victory in both games is narrow enough that the United States is able to keep hold of the tiebreaker advantage it now possesses.
What it all means is this: The Americans are not in a place as horrendous as it seemed Sunday night when countless American fans left Arena da Amazônia with their face paint staining their shirts, carried there by sweat and tears.
“We are pretty much where we wanted to be when we started this whole process,” goalkeeper Tim Howard said. “We wanted to be going into this last game feeling like we have a chance, and we do.”
For that they can in part thank their coach, Jurgen Klinsmann. In the months before the World Cup he tried to lower the expectations for his team, saying it could not win this tournament. The Americans were still learning, still building, he said, telling my colleague Sam Borden, “We’re not at that level yet.”
Maybe the fans believed him, even if they did not like hearing it. Maybe his players became motivated to prove that they were better than he thought, that they could play formidably at this level right now. Maybe all of that was Klinsmann’s goal.
Klinsmann also did his best to make the team seem bound for glory — in 2018. He snubbed Landon Donovan, the most productive scorer in men’s national soccer team history, leaving him off the roster in favor of younger players.
Some of those younger players have played crucial roles as the United States has played and survived two games in intensely challenging conditions in hot, humid stadiums. Now, they and their more experienced, and tired, teammates have to do it one more time. Maybe they can.
So what if Jozy Altidore hurt his hamstring and limped off the field during the Ghana game? Klinsmann’s team is not carried by just one star.
There is Jermaine Jones, who scored the first goal against Portugal. There is Clint Dempsey, who kick-started this whole journey toward the Round of 16 by scoring 29 seconds into the Ghana match. He bloodied his face, broke his nose, then came back for the Portugal game looking as if he had been in a street brawl. His right eye was blackened, his nose swollen. He opted not to wear a face mask to protect his injuries because, the way I see it, he’s a tough Texan and that’s just the way he rolls.
Against Portugal, he scored the go-ahead goal, and he did not even need his head or his feet to do it. That’s for amateurs. He used his belly. The ball smacked against it and rebounded right into the net, making American fans everywhere forget — perhaps briefly — that Donovan ever existed.
When Dempsey scored, it seemed as if the entire United States had leapt out of its chairs and off its sofas and from its seats in the stands at the Arena da Amazônia. Of course, the United States should be beating Portugal, the Twitterverse declared. The bandwagon was so heavy it was scraping the ground.
How quickly fans forgot the limited expectations Klinsmann had tried to set. Then Portugal stole a tie, and how quickly the fans forgot how happy, how confident they had been.
American fans on Twitter posted things like, “gutted,” “bummin” and “in shock.” The United States players themselves had to sort out their feelings.
“We’re kind of sad, I think,” Fabian Johnson said. “If somebody had told us that we were going to have 4 points after those two games, I think we would take it. But at this point, we are a little bit disappointed. We’ve got to look forward.”
So does everyone else. As Howard said, “Football is cruel sometimes,” and he was right.
But the game, as it showed Sunday, can also be exhilarating. That’s the wondrous combination that keeps fans coming back. And Thursday, Klinsmann and his players will be back, too, with a decent chance to advance. There’s no reason to despair. That time will come. Just not yet.
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