United States Under-17s lose opening game 4-3 to Tajikistan

The U-17s suffered a surprise setback to their opening round in South Korea today. Possibly a firm display of underestimating your opponent, but after this loss, neither of their remaining matches seem easy. They will play Tunisia, Thursday, August 23rd and whoopee! it’s on ESPN 2 at the wee hours of the morning (4:00am) and then take on a Belgian squad sitting in fourth place on Sunday, August 26th. The young’uns were sunk by two late goals as each team took turns pummeling each other on the offensive end. The absence of Alex Nimo was surely a factor in the loss and his presence has to be made evident if the US boys are going to advance to the next round. Game recap and standings below…

Scoring Summary:
            1   2   F
USA    1   2   3
TJK     2   2   4 

USA – Mykell Bates (Greg Garza) 9th minute
TJK – Farkhod Vasiev 32.
TJK – Samad Shohzukhurov (Fatkhullo Fatkhuloev) 43.
USA – Greg Garza (Billy Schuler) 48.
USA – Billy Schuler (Alex Nimo) 53.
TJK – Nuriddin Davronov 82.
TJK – Fatkhullo Fatkhuloev 86.

Lineups:
USA: 18-Zac MacMath; 2-Sheanon Williams, 3-Mykell Bates (capt.), 6-Danny Wenzel, 7-Kofi Sarkodie; 8-Jared Jeffrey, 10-Bryan Dominguez (9-Ellis McLoughlin, 86), 17-Greg Garza (16-Brandon Zimmerman, 79), 19-Alex Nimo; 11-Abdusalam Ibrahim (15- Brek Shea, 72), 13-Billy Schuler
Subs Not Used: 1-Josh Lambo, 4-Tommy Meyer, 5-Chris Klute, 12-Kirk Urso, 14-Daniel Cruz, 20-Larry Jackson, 21-Brendan King

US Soccer’s Match Report

The full standings are here.