{"id":49598,"date":"2025-10-12T08:35:42","date_gmt":"2025-10-12T12:35:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/sin-categoria\/u-s-ties-with-ecuador-pochettino-highlights-baloguns-bravery-and-goal-2\/"},"modified":"2025-10-12T08:35:42","modified_gmt":"2025-10-12T12:35:42","slug":"u-s-ties-with-ecuador-pochettino-highlights-baloguns-bravery-and-goal-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/soccer\/u-s-ties-with-ecuador-pochettino-highlights-baloguns-bravery-and-goal-2\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. ties with Ecuador: Pochettino highlights Balogun&#8217;s bravery and goal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Pochettino Praises the Bravery of the United States After Draw Against Ecuador<\/h2>\n\n\nThe United States coach, Mauricio Pochettino, highlighted the fighting spirit of his players after the 1-1 draw against Ecuador in a friendly marked by intensity. Folarin Balogun scored the equalizing goal in the 71st minute.\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>We were very brave to try to go forward, to try to find the space.<\/p><cite>Mauricio Pochettino<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\nPochettino praised his team&#8217;s effort in the second half, especially at Q2 Stadium in Austin, Texas. He acknowledged the difficulty of facing a physical team like Ecuador, but highlighted his players&#8217; ability to find spaces and generate danger.\n\nThe American team, which was losing 1-0 after Enner Valencia&#8217;s goal for Ecuador in the 24th minute, showed resilience and maintained offensive pressure. The tie came thanks to the connection between Malik Tillman and Folarin Balogun.\n\nPochettino expressed his satisfaction with Balogun&#8217;s performance, highlighting his goalscoring ability and work ethic. The coach also celebrated the performance of other key players, but faces challenges for the next friendly against Australia.\n\nAlejandro Zendejas, who did not play against Ecuador, suffered a knee injury and will return to Mexico. Antonee Robinson was also unavailable for the match, and his physical condition is being evaluated.\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Zendejas, bad news, because he&#8217;s leaving tonight&#8230; because he has a small problem in his knee, in the back of his knee. It&#8217;s not a serious problem, but he won&#8217;t be available for the next match, and he has to go back to his club.<\/p><cite>Mauricio Pochettino<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\nChristian Pulisic, who played only 17 minutes against Ecuador, is also not 100% due to an ankle injury. Pochettino will assess his availability for the next match.\n\nThe United States will seek to improve its performance in the upcoming November friendlies against Paraguay and Uruguay.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Pochettino Praises the Bravery of the United States After Draw Against Ecuador The United States coach, Mauricio Pochettino, highlighted the fighting spirit of his players after the 1-1 draw against Ecuador in a friendly marked by intensity. Folarin Balogun scored the equalizing goal in the 71st minute. We were very brave to try to go [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[3483,3301,2661,641],"class_list":{"0":"post-49598","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-soccer","7":"tag-ecuador","8":"tag-folarin-balogun","9":"tag-pochettino","10":"tag-united-states"},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49598\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}