Honestly, I think Mexico already have internalized that they can’t play how they want to play against this US team. They were going so direct and bypassing the midfield so much, not their traditional style at all.
If I had their midfield, I'd try to bypass them too, at least against the US. Their second-best midfielder, Luis Chavez, plays in Russia. Chiquito looks good for Pachuca (from what I hear) but never as good for El Tri. And Guardado and HH got old. They're facing a USA who's 5 deep in guys who can dribble, pass, move and challenge better than anyone on their side except maybe Edson, and frankly I'd pick a couple of our guys over him at this point too.
Gio just totally outclassing the entire field out there. How in god's name did he get enough power on that shot? Nevermind the placement, despite having to kick it while jumping in the air. And I'm not even sure if that was the most ridiculous athletic move he made all evening, it just happened to matter the most to the outcome. Dude was dropping 40-yard field-switch dimes and juking defenders out of their shoes. I feel like Mexican players and fans largely know what to expect from Pulisic, and they feel like they can more or less contain him (he's still effective, obviously, but he's not mauling them every time). They are
terrified of Gio though, ever since that slaloming run in the Azteca where he dribbled like 8 guys in a row, some of them twice. For decades, they've relied on "OK, the Americans might be more athletic, but we have better technique and tactical cohesion and we can beat them by our press and better combination play". That was the wake-up call of, oh shit, we have nobody in that guy's league, or anywhere close to it. And Forest lets him rot on the bench.
Not to mention that the press has been so ineffective against us the last few times around that they largely abandoned it last night in favor of what looked like a 5-4-1 mid-block. We started our "press resistant XI" last night - I cackled when I saw the RAM midfield on the lineup - Reyna Adams McKennie - and realized this was the first time we could really deploy that in a game. Witness the power of this fully armed and operational battle-station, etc.
Who was it who said Uriel Antuna looked like the most dangerous guy on the field for Mexico in the semi? He was subbed out with the lowest rating on the team, had 11 touches in like 70 minutes and was 3 of 7 in completing passes. Completely non-threatening. Chucky Lozano was outclassed too, but at least he was running his ass off out there and took some pride in the proceedings. Gonna be a long plane flight to Eindhoven for him with Malik and Dest there, though. Hey Chucky remember when I did some beach-soccer moves and got past you and 2 other guys? Hey Chucky remember when I juked you and you fell over in the middle of the field?
Man what a night.