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Birthday boy Pulisic scores Champions League winner in his 100th Dortmund appearance

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Christian Pulisic returned to Borussia Dortmund’s squad on Tuesday and made a huge impact coming off the bench.

The 20-year-old helped Dortmund to a 1-0 win in their opening match of the UEFA Champions League group stage, scoring the game-winner in his 100th appearance for the club.

After a scoreless first-half at Club Brugge, Pulisic came off the bench in the 69th minute and netted his first goal of the season not long after.

Pulisic got some luck as he blocked a clearance attempt by Brugge’s Matej Mitrovic which lopped into the net in the 85th minute.

It was an excellent birthday gift for U.S. Men’s National Team midfielder who became the youngest Dortmund player to reach 100 appearances with the club.

As for Lucien Favre’s side they grabbed their first UCL win since March 2017.

Comments

  1. First, the Krafts haven’t genuinely cared about the Revs since before Deuce went to Fulham. IMO, they have no serious interest in building a SSS in the Boston area. Like the replacement Garden; potential future homes for the Sox; the original plans for a domed stadium in Southie; putting the kibosh on the disastrous 2024 Olympic bid; literally every public project of that kind has been met with either fierce local opposition or delays. It took almost 20 years to replace the Garden with the Fleet Center (now the TD Bank Garden). All the other projects were killed.

    Second, admittedly local officials have not been that helpful to the Krafts. Some of the best locations Sommervile, near what is now Assembly Row, the team got little to no cooperation IMO, the best remaining site is Suffolk Downs. The plan to build near the vacant Bayside Expo looks good on paper, but the traffic circle nearby is a nightmare without adding 20K of extra people to the area. Logistically Suffolk Downs might not be any better, so there’s that.

    Oh and MLS has been great…for players from the lesser CONCACAF countries. Not only were they cheap acquisitions for the league, it allowed players from those countries to play regularly against USMNT players. After a few years, guys from Jamaica, Honduras, T & T, Costa Rica, Panama, and even Canada, suddenly were saying, “these guys are mediocre and soft. They have no fight.”

    MLS should be a SELLER’S league of young talent (like Tyler Adams) and a buyer of older 28 plus year old Americans in the twilight of their career. A reward of playing at home after toiling in Europe.

    Talent-wise, I think our younger players are far better than the failed 2018 team, Pulisic not withstanding. We need a quality coach. I’m not saying it isn’t Berhalter. Personally, I’d rather have him than say Moyes. There is a chance that the players will buy into what Berhalter is selling. He has credibility both as a former MNT player and he has done very well at Columbus with limited resources. If it isn’t GB, it’s time for the federation to hire a coach ASAP or we can have another debacle in 4 years, which would be a bigger fiasco IMO in part because we have better players this cycle.

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  2. Anyone have any thoughts about that photo and his facial expression? Was that directed at Wolf, or whom? Not exactly the look of a nice guy or a mature adult, more a taunt against … others who weren’t so lucky? Or a grimace acknowledging the role of sheer chance?
    .
    But still, an away goal in an otherwise lackluster UCL game, that’s not nothing.
    .
    twocents, thank you for sharing your MLS memories, even if I don’t share your enthusiasm for USL etc.
    .

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  3. McKennie registers assist ✔

    Birthday boy Pulisic scores ✔

    Both in a Champions League game?!!! ?✔

    Now all I need is something about Kekuta Manneh tearing up the Swiss Super League with FC St. Gallen…..and I will be in heaven!!! ??

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    • He’s played in one league match out of six and came off the bench in two cup matches against 5th division sides. That is after playing 8 league minutes (the only matched he even made the roster) for Pachuca and some cup matches. His last professional goal was a year ago Sunday. He’s only 23 and it is encouraging that he started their last league match but it doesn’t look like he’s going to be tearing it up anytime soon.

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  4. “The 19-year-old helped Dortmund to a 1-0 win in their opening match…” If you’re going to make the fact that he scored on birthday the focal point of the article, it’s probably best to get his age right… The kid was born in 1998.

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  5. 19 year old playing at the biggest football stage in the world…get him to MLS, where 95 percent of games are meaningless, everyone gets a participation ribbon, a third of the teams play of fake turf, and Michael Bradley gets even more awful by the year, if this is even possible. Cause why you wouldn’t leave AS Roma for Toronto FC, lol.
    Seriously now, good for Pulisic, a truly bright light in the otherwise mediocre landscape of American football talent, or lack thereof…

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    • If you could make 25 million over 4 years and set not just your wife and kids but your family for generations to come why wouldn’t you leave Roma for Toronto. Let’s not forget that these guys are responsible to their families first, USMNT followers are little bit down their list.

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    • you done trying to make yourself feel good with this over the top dig at MLS?? People like you can say what they want but MLS has been good to the NT, and more importantly there has yet to be another USMNT to surpass what the heavy MLS rostered 2002 WC team has in terms of global success.

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    • You wrote, “Pulisic, a truly bright light in the otherwise mediocre landscape of American football talent, or lack thereof…”Tyler Adams is supposedly slated for Leipzig this January. We could have a back line of Brooks, Miazga, Yedlin, a LB to be determined, a midfield of Pulisic, McKennie, Adams, and Weah, all playing in a top 5 European league. Add Wood as striker and maybe Sargent in the future, and we could have a team with nothing but outfield players who play in a top 5 European league, which is far more than Mexico has ever had. I don’t believe any Asian team can boast that either and probably not any African teams, although Ghana has come close.Even teams like Colombia and Chile have used players in their domestic leagues, as have such European teams like Sweden, Denmark, even Holland. The young talent is there, it’s a matter of integrating it and having them reach their potential together.

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      • The top talent in those countries is better though so you can hide a few domestic players, none of those come close to playing as many domestics as the US.
        ———————————————————————————————————————
        Denmark: 3 domestic players: two who had spent time in Top 5 leagues and GK who is now playing for Eintracht.
        Sweden: didn’t have one player in its domestic league although they did have guys from other lower leagues like MLS, Denmark, and Russia.
        Colombia: 2 domestics both GK, and one in Paraguay who did not see the field in Russia
        Holland in 2014: had 10 domestics most of who went to Top 5 leagues and all played for PSV, Ajax, or Feynoord who play every year in Champions League or Europa League
        Chile 2016 Copa America: Used 5 domestic players 2 were GK that did not play, one in Ecuador and one in Liga MX and then almost everyone else in a top 5 league and several who are absolute stars.

      • The talent in the USA is now made up of players whose parents were part of the youth soccer movement in the 90s (Weah is an exception).

        Likely not all the present players had parents who were outstanding players, but most parents had learned enough to have an appreciation of the game, that was mostly not true for kids in the 80s and 90s. Since parents are the first coaches, that matters and it sets the tone for future growth.

        I always thought that the idea that the US would be a word power in soccer 10 or 20 years after the 1994 WC to be pretty optimistic and naive. I continue to think it will not be until the kids of the kids playing youth soccer in 19990 to 2000 became young 20 year-olds that the US would begin to assert itself. That time is now!

        Now and the next 10-15 years should be the time that the USA starts to make its impact on the world soccer stage.

    • Ivan, you are quite an MLS hater! You bring it up when the article has absolutely nothing to do with MLS!

      MLS arguably has a higher percentage of meaningful games than any other league.

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    • i love mls. it makes me deeply happy. i remember when toyota park opened in frisco, texas. (used to be called pizza hut park back then.) former usmnt player john harkes was tv announcer, i think. harkes was the first usa player to ever play in the premier league, i believe. before deuce. before mcbride. it was harkes. harkes was part of the generation that played in italy wc in ’94, yes? in the days before mls. a team of guys who played soccer in college. and who knows where after that. we had no national league at that time. it was a real mess. harkes, lalas, wynalda, baloa, others came home from wherever they were playing in 1995 to help start the league. mls. in 1995, the league had no soccer specific stadiums. i think don garber hadn’t even invented the term sss yet. when the hunts and krafts and anschuts and kroenkes began throwing their considerable financial might into the league, the first sss stadiums began to appear. crew stadium was first in 1999 (now mapfre stadium). then others, slowly, one by one. then faster. now they pop up like daisies every time you blink. anyway, getting back to john harkes, i remember when pizza hut park (now toyota park) opened in frisco, texas. harkes was the color commentator for the tv broadcast. harkes just couldn’t believe that beautiful soccer stadium when he saw it. it was like christmas. they could have just put a pretty ribbon on it. it was everything every fan and player ever wanted. a home.

      i love mls because it gave everyone a home.

      thank you, hunts, krafts, anschuts, kroenkes.
      thank you harkes, lalas, wynaldo, balboa.
      thank you don garber.
      i love our league that you created.
      thank you for giving soccer a home in the usa.

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