US advances out of Group of Death!

Going into the World Cup, pundits across the US and the world gave the US very little chance of advancing out of the so-called Group of Death.  Ghana had kicked the US out of the last 2 World Cups, and Germany and Portugal are two of the best teams in the world.  Guess what folks?  USMNT wasn't about to take those predictions lying down.  They fought through every match, and thanks to Germany beating Portugal by so many goals (goal differential was key after Portugal's late goal against Ghana) we have officially advanced out of the Group of Death.  Huzzah!!

Woke up for the US-Germany match to a strong, steady rain that wouldn't end up letting up until halfway through the match.  It made our 2.5 hour journey to the stadium much more annoying than it otherwise would have been. Everyone was soaked by the time we finally arrived at the stadium, 20km outside of town.  Luckily, Recife had set up good public transportation to get to the match, so that part went fairly smoothly (other than having to get through some massively flooded roads due to 3 days of rain).  Getting to Recife from Olinda was a giant (wet) pain, but we finally worked that out and met some nice Colombian-Americans on the way (crazily, they'd also be on our exact bus back from the match hours later...small world).

Fans were a bit more subdued heading into this match versus the earlier ones, thanks in part to the rain and in part to the massive task ahead of us of facing Germany.  Tons and tons of German fans too, with much better songs and chants than the US has (they've been at this longer than we have). We tried to up our game a bit during the match with some new cheers, I think partly inspired by the Germans.  We even chanted in Portuguese (Estados Unidos!).  During the game, US fans were definitely enthusiastic and IMO out-chanted the Germans (they only got loud after the German goal).

We were excited to be in the upper deck which meant we were covered. Lower deck fans got soaked even further. We were still in the US supporters section, which has been really fun.  I think this was the first match in which US fans didn't outnumber our opponent's fans.  There were a lot of Germans there (direct flights from Frankfurt doesn't hurt).  I think we represented well though and tried to inspire our team through a tough match.  

The US team held our own for most of the first half, and we were lucky to only allow one goal in the second half.  Kudos to a strong defensive performance.  USMNT did what they had to do to advance (win, tie, or lose by minimal goals).  

After the match, USMNT came over to celebrate with the fans, celebrating their advancement to the next round (we all knew the Portugsl-Ghana score).  They looked so happy, despite the game loss. As Erin said, only in the World Cup can a tie feel like a loss and a loss feel like a win.  USA! USA! USA!

(Btw, the coverage at home we've seen of Christiano Ronaldo "saving" the US team with his last minute goal is so annoyingly inaccurate. US would have advanced had Portugal-Ghana tied, so we didn't need Portugal to beat Ghana)

We're sad not to be seeing the next match in Brazil, esp since we are heading to Salvador, the site of their next match just by happenstance (we head home tomorrow night). Hopefully the US continues to have amazing and loud support, and we can keep rolling through this World Cup.  Bring on Belgium!

Excited to watch the game at home, however, with other excited Americans (and English commentary - we've watched every match here in portuguese).  Chicago is having giant watch parties in Grant Park, so we may head there if they continue that for the knockout rounds.

Off to Salvador!