THE GAME IS 100% PSYCHOLOGICAL...:

USA draw recalls Belo Horizonte and one of English football's most infamous results (Colin Stewart, 12/05/09, The Scotsman)

On 29 June, 1950, at the World Cup finals in Brazil, the largely amateur USA side – captained by Eddie McIlvenney from Greenock – pulled off one of the sport's greatest ever shocks with a 1-0 win against an England side who were installed as co-favourites to win the tournament before the finals began.

Back then, three years before Ferenc Puskas's Mighty Magyars knocked England's lights out at Wembley, the outcome caused a sensation and as the score from the Belo Horizonte stadium flashed across the world on the news wires, disbelieving sports editors assumed a printing error: England had surely won 10-1? [...]

So certain were the US squad of a hiding, a handful stayed up the night before the game drinking to their own defeat.

A few hours later, expectations began to change when Haitian striker Larry Gaetjens headed the only goal of the game late in the first half – some say he was ducking out of the way when the ball struck him on the left ear and bounced into the net.

...so we know what will be playing on Team USA's flight to South Africa.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 5, 2009 6:54 AM