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The day has finally arrived, the hype is at its peak for the Copa America's 100 year celebration where for the first time in history, there will be a large number of Concacaf teams and all CONMEBOL teams from South America set to clash against each other. You could very well say that this can be called the REAL Copa America. Since it started being celebrated back in 1916, only South American teams played it and at the start of the 90's Mexico was invited. Since then, there had only been up to two Concacaf teams as guests.
But today it all changes and there is no better country to host an event as big as this, than the United States who will begin the road to the final with this Friday's opener against the all powerful Colombia. In Group A, they will play against Costa Rica and Paraguay as well. Ahead of the match, United States manager Jurgen Klinsmann spoke to some Facebook fans during a Q & A and talked about what they can expect for the match.
"This is a little bit like two years ago. We talked about that with the Ghana game before Brazil, before the World Cup started, we made it kind of like our final. We start the tournament with a final. We are going to go for it. We are going to do that and we are going to try and make it happen on Friday night because it would give us a big, big boost towards the game against Costa Rica and then finishing off the group with Paraguay. Similar to the World Cup, we need a good result in the first game."
Michael Bradley also talked about the United States' last two friendly matches where they had a chance to find the best starting XI possible: "It's a good blend of youth and experience. I think there's good balance in the team, and I think there's big determination within the team to make this a special few weeks. We're happy with the way things went in these last two games. In terms of the spirit and the mentality of the group, it always helps, but we all understood that the second that whistle blew in Kansas City to finish the [Bolivia] game, those results meant nothing.
"Now it's about understanding that the real thing is starting and we've got to have the right mentality, the right focus and know the difference between these types of games."
Take a look at their last five matches:
United States
W (4-0) - Bolivia - Friendly
W (1-0) - Ecuador - Friendly
W (3-1) - Puerto Rico - Friendly
W (4-0) - Guatemala - WCQ
L (0-2) - Guatemala - WCQ
Colombia
W (3-1) - Haiti - Friendly
W (3-1) - Ecuador - WCQ
W (3-2) - Bolivia - WCQ
L (0-1) - Argentina - WCQ
D (1-1) - Chile - WCQ
Predicted starting XI
United States starting lineup (4-3-3 formation): Guzan; Yedlin, Besler, Brooks, Johnson; Beckerman, Bradley, Jones; Zardes, Dempsey, Pulisic
Colombia starting lineup (4-2-3-1 formation): Ospina; Zapata, Murillo, Arias, Fabra; Aguilar, Sanchez; Cardona, Rodriguez, Cuadrado; Bacca
Photo credit: US Soccer
