On the morning of February 3, Beijing time, the third phase of the World Cup in North America continued, with the United States sitting at home to meet Honduras, which was out of the early round of the previous round. As a result, after 90 minutes, the U.S. team relied on goals from McKenny, Zimmerman and Pulisic to win 3-0, giving the opponent an embarrassment of 11 rounds of no winlessness.
As the former dark horse team in North America, Honduras' strength cannot be underestimated. Although the national population is only 990W, Honduras has competed in the World Cup 3 times in its history. At this point, their football performance is far better than that of the national football team, even if their current FIFA ranking is lower than that of the national football team.
Honduras, which did not have to participate in the first 2 rounds of qualifiers, played extremely badly in this World Cup qualifier. In the first 10 rounds, they only drew 3 and lost 7, and they have not tasted a single victory so far. Facing the big favourites in this game, Honduras, who played away, knew that it was inevitable to lose.
It is worth mentioning that the ambient temperature of this game is very low, reaching minus 17 degrees Celsius. In the game screen, we saw that many players, including the referee, had to wrap their headscarves, scarves and other warmth.
In such a harsh environment, Honduras, who were out early in the last round, had a lower will to fight. In contrast, the U.S. team lost to Canada in the last round, and they had to win to boost morale. And considering the home games, the American players play more actively.
Just seven minutes into the game, McKenny, who played for Juventus, scored a successful header to help the United States lead 1-0. Just before halftime, U.S. guard Zimmerman extended his aggregate dominance to two goals, and the home team returned to the locker room with a two-goal advantage.
Back in the second half, Honduras made a large-scale substitution in a short period of time, but it did not work. Instead, the Captain Pulisic, who came on as a substitute for the U.S. team, went down again in the 66th minute to help the home team extend the score again. The 3-goal lead for the U.S. team basically laid the score for the win on the field. Considering the ambient temperature of the arena and the outcome of the game, the two sides did not run much overall in the later time, and the two sides played the whole game in this tacit understanding.
For the Hondurans team, the morning game was really uncomfortable. The first is the environment of the game, they need to fight away in extreme cold and low temperatures. Secondly, in the case of being out, they still failed to get rid of the decline of the team, losing the opponent with a big defeat and then losing the opponent, continuing the embarrassment of the 21-year World Preliminary Round away win over the United States.
This World Preliminary Tournament is a nightmare journey for Honduras, they have not won 11 games so far, which is more desperate than the national football team. In the remaining three World Cup matches, Honduras are played against Panama, Mexico and Jamaica.