The United States prepares for Australia with control of Group D on the line
EL PASO, Texas (KFOX 14, CBS4) — The United States are set to take on Australia in Seattle on Friday in both team’s second match of the Group Stage. Both the US and Australia are atop Group D with three points each.
In the United States opener, the US made a statement with a dominant 4-1 victory over Paraguay. The US came out firing scoring three goals in the first half. Paraguay struck back in the second half, but Giovanni Reyna capped off the victory with a stunning goal.
“We’ve set an expectation for ourselves that if we can perform like that, why not do it all the time?” US defender Antonee Robinson said. “It is not always going to be easy as we turn up and play a perfect game every time. There is going to be moments where we are against it and we have to grind out results.”
Australia took down Turkiye 2-0 in their first match. Turkiye controlled most of the ball, however the Australian defense remained strong. They absorbed the Turkish attack and broke on the counter with Nestory Irankunda and Connor Metcalfe getting on the scoresheet.
The US and Australia faced off in a friendly back in October 2025. The Americans claimed a 2-1 victory with Haji Wright scoring both goals for the US.
The US enters Friday as -165 favorites on DraftKings, however they are not overlooking what they describe as a dangerous Australia team.
“Australia is a team that has been progressing and they came to the World Cup and showed it against Turkiye,” USMNT head coach Mauricio Pochettino said. “They are a team to be reckoned with and we have to be at our best to be if we want to be close to winning.”
This US team is filled with confidence and belief in the group that they have. The Americans not only feel they can get a positive result on Friday, but that they have the ability to make a real run in the tournament.
“We are all on the same page of fighting and doing something special this summer,” Robinson said. “You can see everyone is running that extra five yards and sprinting to close stuff down. There is a real hunger and energy in the team that is baseline of going to win a tournament. If we can keep this level up, I don’t see why we would limit ourselves to not being able to win the whole thing.”
The status of US star Christian Pulisic is still up in the air. Pulisic was withdrawn at halftime against Paraguay. He is officially listed as day-to-day by US Soccer. If he is not fit to start, the US feels they have plenty of options to cover for his absence.
“Hopefully Christian is ready to go for the game because he is a big player for us,” US midfielder Brenden Aaronson said. “But, everybody has to be ready to go. The depth of this team is something that I have never seen before. Coming up to this big Australia game, we are going to need everbody.”
The alternatives to Pulisic includes: Reyna, Timothy Weah, Sebastian Berhalter, Aaronson and El Paso native Alex Zendejas.
Kick off between the United States and Australia is at 1pm MST on Friday at Lumen Field. You can catch the game on KFOX.