Fresh off his best U.S. men’s national team performance to date, Sergiño Dest carried over the momentum gained from last week’s Man of the Match effort in Wednesday’s World Cup qualifying win against Costa Rica with a stellar outing in Barcelona’s important 3-1 win against Valencia.
Dest was deployed as a right winger in Barcelona’s 4-3-3 setup and was a threat throughout, contributing four successful dribbles and completing 31 of 33 passes, including a pair of key passes, one of which helped set up the Coutinho goal that secured the victory.
DEST TO COUTINHO 😤
BARCELONA UP 3-1. pic.twitter.com/oN3nYMocW7
— ESPN FC (@ESPNFC) October 17, 2021
Dest has been on a tear lately, having earned SBI Americans Abroad Player of the Week honors for the second time in three weeks.
Dest wasn’t the only American to enjoy a memorable weekend. Here is a look at the other top Americans Abroad performers of the past weekend:
Antonee Robinson, Fulham
Another playing enjoying a heck of an October, Robinson followed up the recent announcement that he’s expecting his first child with a goal-scoring performance for Fulham in a West London Derby win against Queens Park Rangers.
Chris Richards, Hoffenheim
Less than 48 hours after making his first USMNT World Cup qualifying start, Chris Richards successfully traveled from Ohio to Germany, and while he wasn’t in the starting lineup for Hoffenheim’s match against Cologne, he wound up playing a big role in a 5-0 rout. Richards came on as a first-half substitute and played a 54-minute shift, delivering four aerials won, two clearances while completing 21 of 28 passes as Hoffenheim rolled to a big win.
Ulysses Llanez, St. Polten
A loan move in search of regular playing time landed Llanez in Austria, and while his time at St. Polten started slowly, the teenage winger has settled into a starting role and is coming off his best pro match to date. The Wolfsburg loanee scored a goal and added an assist in St. Polten’s 6-1 win vs. Grazer on Friday. It marked the second time in three matches Llanez had scored a goal.
Zack Steffen, Manchester City
Fresh off a win in his World Cup qualifying debut, Steffen was solid in his English Premier League debut, making a pair of saves in Manchester City’s 2-0 win against Burnley. Steffen completed 28 of 33 passes and looked poised starting in place of Brazilian star Ederson, who was coming off international duty with Brazil.
Honorable Mention
Christian Cappis (Brondby), Konrad De La Fuente (Marseille), DeAndre Yedlin (Galatasaray), Duane Holmes (Huddersfield), Ian Harkes (Dundee United)
What did you think of Dest’s performance? What Americans Abroad player impressed you the most this past week?
Share your thoughts below.
We’ve definitely been looking for a solution at RW…since right now Berhalter’s solution seems to be Paul Arriola (lordy!), who IMHO should not even be on the qualifying roster and should probably be relegated to Gold Cup duty at best. (Arriola could not even stick with a Championship squad; the Swans – currently 17th in the Championship table sent him home early because they didn’t think he could help them.)
The difference in skill level between Dest and Arriola is…pretty expansive. Especially if Scally can come in and replace Dest at RB I think we might end up getting upgrades at multiple spots.
We have plenty of options at RW….Reyna, Weah, Aaronson, Konrad, Musah, Hoppe, Gioacchini, etc… It’s only Gregg (and a couple MLS revisionists) who rates Arriola as worthy of being in an A-Team camp.
While not opposed to Dest being given some minutes at RW I don’t love the idea either. Of our RBs only Dest & Scally are seeing regular minutes…the others (Yedlin, Cannon, Moore, & Reynolds) haven’t exactly been lighting things up at the club level, and since Scally is likely also our best back-up LB I’m not real interested in shifting Dest to the front line all the time.