You already know that the US Men lost their Olympic opener to France 3-0, despite putting in a solid performance.

Their opponents on Saturday, New Zealand, defeated Guinea 2-1 in their first group stage match. The game was fairly even in terms of attacking opportunity, but NZ managed to pull out the victory. Their keeper Alex Paulsen (who we spotlighted in our Men’s Olympic Soccer preview) was fantastic and made a big difference in the match. Guinea controlled possession and shots, but New Zealand created more genuine scoring chances.

Midfielder Matthew Garbett opened the scoring in the 25th minute when he intercepted Guinea while they built from the back, and finished unassisted. That goal came just moments after he missed a PK. Guinea equalized in the 72nd minute, but New Zealand retook the lead through forward Ben Waine in the 76th. Guinea threw everything forward and put New Zealand under pressure in the final 15 minutes (plus 11 minutes of stoppage time!), but the Kiwis held on for the victory.

As noted in our recap of the USA v. France match, this game is virtually must win for the US Men. If we lose and France beats Guinea, we’re out after only 2 games. A draw would leave some potential to advance but we would need to overturn a massive disadvantage in goal difference in our 3rd group stage match and/or an unlikely collapse from France. Here’s the Men’s table heading into round 2 of Group A action.

New Zealand played well defensively against Guinea. They maintained their shape all game, but they were also surprisingly effective in attack. We will say Guinea’s defense didn’t exactly impress.

In our view, they key men to watch for New Zealand are:

As you can see, the two are similar in stature, position, and playing style. However, Tessman looks to be the better player at this point. We need him to prove it on Saturday as we believe this is the matchup to watch when we take on New Zealand.

We expect the US to dominate the ball, needing to break down a fairly low block from New Zealand. New Zealand lacks the pace to hurt us on the counter, so we feel comfortable pushing the outside backs up high.

Most of New Zealand’s back line is very tall, including RB Tyler Bindon. However, LB Sam Sutton is only 5’9”, is not even a regular starter in the Australian League, and only wins ~30% of his aerial duels. We think he’s a weak spot we should attack – ideally in the air.

We would therefore like to see Kevin Paredes line up at left wing, with Caleb Wiley at left back. Paredes should use his quickness and consistent overlapping runs from Wiley to force Bindon to defend wide. The two of them can put in great crosses. We’d ask our center forward, Duncan McGuire, to make near post runs and then hit crosses to the back post, where Sutton could be isolated against the 6’2” Tessman making a run from deep, or the athletic Nathan Harriel getting forward from right back.

We’d also like to see Griffin Yow (who had a nice goal called back for offsides last game) get the start at right wing, with Paxten Aaronson moving into the center attacking mid role. Outside of one shot from distance, we thought Mihailovic was ineffective against France and think Aaronson’s quickness may create more problems for New Zealand’s strong but slow central defense. Lastly, let’s give Gaga Slonina a chance in goal as Schulte was underwhelming at best against France. 

We’ve been proven wrong on a lot of calls for USA victories this summer, most notably in Copa America against Panama. However, we are the better side here and believe our quality will show. Anything can happen, but even gambling markets are giving us a greater than 60% chance of a win here. Let’s go U-S-A!