Why USA against Australia will be an all-time great World Cup game

Analysis

Tom Weber | Writer

Multilingual sports writer who specialises in European football and American soccer.

The United States men’s national team will take on the Socceroos at Seattle Stadium (Lumen Field) today in a World Cup game that has the potential to be a bona fide all-timer.

Fans of Major League Soccer know that Seattle is a soccer city. After all, the Sounders have become one of the division’s heavyweights since joining the league in 2009.

They have won two MLS Cups and are the only US team to claim a continental trophy since 2000, having won the CONCACAF Champions League (now Champions Cup) in 2022.

To outsiders, however, Seattle may not be the most obvious host city for a World Cup. That’s because this year’s edition will be its first truly global soccer event. Seattle was not a host city in 1994 because it was simply not yet ready. While World Cup fever was gripping the US, the Kingdome, Seattle’s previous major sporting arena, was literally falling apart.

The initial proposal to build a new stadium for the Seahawks, the city’s NFL team, was not universally popular with Seattle residents, but it was pushed through when the provision was added that it could also host major soccer events.

The building was initially known as Seahawks Stadium, but the very first sporting event that took place after its opening in 2002 was a men’s and women’s soccer doubleheader. The Sounders, then part of the USL, also called the new arena home, not just the Seahawks. It is just as much a soccer stadium as it is an NFL one.

Seattle has been dying to host World Cup games

Nevertheless, the wait for the world’s game to truly arrive in Seattle would be a long one. International games are usually not played at what is today known as Lumen Field because of the stadium’s artificial turf. In fact, the US men’s team hasn’t played in Seattle in a decade.

The last time it occurred was purely a coincidence. Seattle was a host city for the Copa America Centenario in 2016, but the US’s quarterfinal game was supposed to be played in New Jersey. An unexpected upset by Costa Rica against Colombia, however, sent the USMNT to Seattle instead.

Not one of the current players - not even veteran Tim Ream - has played a USMNT match in Seattle. But they won’t be entirely unprepared for what’s about to hit them. Long-time Sounders midfielder Cristian Roldan has made sure to ready the team for what they are about to experience.

“I’ve told them that the city is ready, that the city is energized,” he said at training on Thursday. “We haven’t had a game here in a long time, and we’ve been desperate to host a World Cup game, a US men’s national team game.

“So they’re going to feel the crowd, feel the energy, and it’s about feeding off it.”

The atmosphere for the US’s impressive 4-1 win over Paraguay in Los Angeles was raucous, but Seattle could be on another level. After all, Lumen Field was previously the loudest stadium in the world.

The US-Australia match will be the second game of the tournament to be played there. The first was Egypt’s surprising 1-1 draw with Belgium - and the place was bouncing. Travelling supporters were pleasantly surprised by both the atmosphere and the ease with which they managed to get to the stadium.

Several posts have gone viral on social media, praising Seattle’s public transit - with the city making extra capacities available free of charge - and the scenic view of downtown the stadium offers.

There has been a party atmosphere in Seattle ahead of the US-Australia game. The Aussie fans have brought the noise after coming down from Vancouver, but the US will have a monumental home-field advantage.

Seattle has waited decades for this moment. The soccer-crazed metropolis, squirreled away in the Northwest, has seen Pele and Lionel Messi play in the flesh, it has seen Brian Schmetzer and Megan Rapinoe lift trophies, but it has not yet seen a US team at the World Cup. This will change today - and the city is ready for it.

Bad blood between the teams

If the Seattle crowd needed extra motivation to make it a hostile atmosphere for the Socceroos, it only needs to recall last October’s game between the US and Australia in Colorado. Although officially only a friendly, it was anything but.

The Australians were straight at the US’s throat from kick-off in a heated, overly aggressive clash that saw several flashpoints. Ultimately, the US came back from 1-0 down to prevail 2-1 because they managed to match the Socceroos’ physicality.

When looking back at the Mauricio Pochettino era in a few months or years, the US’s new mentality will perhaps be his most enduring legacy. He has turned a talented but soft “golden generation” into a mature team that, as Sebastian Berhalter has pointed out, doesn’t “take sh*t” from anyone.

This mentality really came to the fore in the clash with Australia in October, when several players were legitimately ready to throw hands, and the same kind of approach may be necessary today because there is genuine bad blood between the teams.

Despite being so similar - or perhaps because of it - there is a long-standing rivalry between the US and Australia. The Socceroos feel that they have been disrespected by the US media and want to make a statement.

Their smash-and-grab win over Turkey has put them in a great position. On paper, they don’t need to take the game to the US; they can do what they do best: defend deep and then try to spring counterattacks. That said, Pochettino and company will have done their homework.

Turkey were restricted to mostly harmless long shots. The US surely won’t make the same mistake. They will have worked out a way of trying to break down Australia and exploit their weaknesses.

Therefore, we may actually see an open game with both sides going at it given that neither team really has anything to lose. With both having won their opening match, they can put on a show in their pursuit of a place in the knockout stages.

The fact that the US may be without Christian Pulisic, who is doubtful for this game after his substitution against Paraguay, could also embolden the Socceroos to be a little more expansive. With the attacking talent that they have, particularly wonderkid Nestory Irankunda, they should back themselves to be able to hurt the US.

If both teams decide to play and the atmosphere is as good as anticipated, we could be in for an all-time great World Cup match.

Written by

Tom Weber | Writer

Tom Weber is an experienced, multilingual sports writer who specialises in European football and American soccer as part of his freelance work for FootballTransfers.

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