Christian Pulisic could hardly have had a better start to his own personal Copa America tournament, and the United States began in the ideal way with a 2-0 win over Bolivia last night.
The USA did what they needed to do on Sunday evening as they began Group C with three points against a team that they were admittedly expected to beat, taking a step towards the knockouts in the process.
Pulisic set the tone with a goal in the third minute. A corner was taken short and the Milan star was fed by Timothy Weah, cutting onto his right foot on the left corner of the box and curling a brilliant shot that went in off the crossbar.
Folarin Balogun got the second goal for the United States and Pulisic had a big hand in that too, leading a counter-attack down the middle and spreading play to the left before the Monaco man found the back of the net with a low angled drive.
You can see the highlights from Pulisic’s two-goal-contribution evening below, while head coach Gregg Berhalter was full of praise for his inspirational skipper afterwards.
Christian Pulisic vs Bolivia 🔥 pic.twitter.com/PI1E62MpiO
— 🎬N (@Nino12x) June 24, 2024
“He’s a selfless leader. He goes out and competes and works, works really hard and that helps the team and then you add to the fact that he’s highly skilled and can make plays on the offensive end and create chances on the offensive end,” he said (via Goal).
“It’s a great combination, and what you see is him supporting his teammates, him backing guys, him pushing guys. To me, it was an outstanding performance. He got coach’s man of the match and it was much deserved.”
First, Boliva is a terrible team. What you see in the video is Pulisic’s strenght. He makes good choices. He’s got skills and decent speed, but he then makes good choices. One of the complaints often with ACM was he didn’t attack enough. Rather than take a low percentage option he would pass the ball and not attack.
In US, Pulisic played in his favourite position. Maybe Fonseca needs to try him in that position frequently, and put Lazy Leao on the bench in few occasions. Or sell that Lazy Leao to PSG to get big cash and strengthen the team
Bolivia was terrible with a capital TERRIBLE. They will face better competition and we’ll see what Puli has in the tank against better opposition.
That US roster ain’t worth writing home about either. But I’m glad to see Puli attacking so much and taking a leadership role head on.
CP did what a great player should do against a bad team.