In a marquee match, the Netherlands went on the offensive against the United States. The Dutch played in a three-guard formation, led by Van Dijk, Ake and Tim Bell, with wingbacks Dumfries and Brind remaining unchanged. In the midfield, the Dutch adjusted their tactics by bringing Fodéjon and De Jong into the defense to form a defensive midfield, while the attacking midfield was anchored by Klaassen. Up front, Depay and the recently in-form Gacobo are paired in attack.
For their part, the U.S. put out a 433 formation with a forward line of Pulisic and Tim Weah and Jesus Ferreira, a midfield of the impactful Moussa, Adams, and McNee, and a back line of Robinson, Tim Ream, Zimmerman, and Durst. This is also considered the best lineup for the USMNT to date.
(Starting lineups for both teams)
At the beginning of the match, the Dutch midfielders generally dropped back to guard against the quick attack of the USA. The U.S. team is young and energetic, and is very fast up front. The Dutch sent purely defensive midfielder De Jong to help Fodé Jong build a defense in the midfield to stop the USA's fast attack. However, USA had a great chance in the second minute of the game when Pulisic shot at the front of the net, but it was parried by Dutch goalkeeper Knoppert. Subsequently, the Dutch team was more cautious, with a large number of players staying in the backfield to hold back the U.S. offense.
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The U.S. tried to break the deadlock by pressing the ball, but the midfielders unconsciously pressed forward and the Dutch seized the opportunity. In the ninth minute, Gakpo played a pass through the middle to Dumfries on the right, who killed the line, saw that Klaassen had sprinted toward the defense, drew the attention of the defenders, and Dumfries sent a direct diagonal 45-degree pass back to Depay, who pushed his shot in unopposed from 14 yards out.
The Dutch opened up a lead and quickly went into defensive counterattack mode. The U.S. could only continue to play a pressing fast attack, but the Dutch group of defenders and defensive backs surrounded their backfield quite tightly, making it difficult for both U.S. sides to invade the defense. Gakpo in this World Cup outstanding performance, this game he is also constantly doing sudden before and after the distribution, whether it is distributed to the right wing up Dumfries, or to the big brother Depay, and even to the left up Blind, he did quite well. Because Gakpo in front of the field on the ability to find space and distribution of such, so that Klaassen can not have to press forward all the time, as far as possible to stay in the middle of the defense, increasing the defensive zone, so that the United States team is very difficult to cross the minefield one step.
The U.S. kept harassing Fodéjon, so he basically didn't have too many chances to get forward in this game, mostly covering Brind on the left side, which prevented the U.S.'s Weah from finding too many chances to attack the box. The U.S. then kept the ball on Pulisic on the left, and Weah had a nice shot from outside the box blocked in the 42nd minute.
Just before the end of the first half, it was again Dumfries who got the ball after a throw in from the right, he waited on the right and the central area was watched, at this point Blind came up in a breath of fresh air from the far side of the field to the 12-yard box to take the pass and pump it straight through the goal, this was a bit of carelessness from Dexter, who completely missed Blind accelerating from the far side to the point of having no one there to block it when there was a gap in the central space.
The Netherlands took a two-goal lead into the second half, and the U.S. immediately replaced Jesus Ferreira, who barely got the ball, with Reyna in the second half. The leading Dutch team also removed Klaassen and De Jong for Bergwijn and Kupmenils to further enhance the effectiveness of their side attacks and counter-attacks, with Gacobo moving back into the midfield position.
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With Reyna on the pitch, the U.S. stepped up their side attacks and did get some results. There were a couple of attacks into the Dutch box, and the U.S. then made consistent substitutions for Brendan Ascension, Haji Wright, and Yedlin, finally reaping the benefits of a goal in the 76th minute. Pulisic switched to the right side of the attack to force a ground pass, Haji Wright also went to the front point hard for a flick, the ball was originally passed to Wright's left foot, he barely wanted to shoot the result into a strange refraction, the ball in the air into a strange arc into the goal, the ball the Dutch defense is difficult to react.
Haji Wright came on and really increased the impact as the U.S. played a more direct game, but they had another leaky stare down on the back line. In the 80th minute, Blind got the ball on the left side of the field, at which point the U.S. retreated into the box in large numbers, having watched all of the Dutch frontcourt. However, Dumfries sneaked into the box from the right flank and had been there for a while waving, and the U.S. didn't spot him. Brind, on the other hand, had seen his teammate take a big curling ball straight up and around to the far post, where Dumfries met the ball and jumped up in the air to push it home, bringing the score to 3-1.
