Facebook
Fark
Digg
Reddit
StumbleLas Vegas’ Herculez Gomez starts for U.S. in dramatic soccer win against Algeria
AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko
United States’ Herculez Gomez, right, United States’ Clint Dempsey and United States’ Landon Donovan, left, listen to referee Frank De Bleeckere, from Belgium, second from left, during the World Cup group C soccer match between the United States and Algeria at the Loftus Versfeld Stadium in Pretoria, South Africa, Wednesday, June 23, 2010.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010 | 9:35 a.m.
World Cup: U.S. Scores to Advance!
Viewing video requires the latest version of Adobe's Flash Player
del.icio.usThe mood at Crown & Anchor British Pub Wednesday morning was somber for U.S. fans with only three minutes until certain elimination from the World Cup. But in the first minute of injury overtime, Landon Donovan scored a history-making goal that advances the U.S. to the second round with a 1-0 win over Algeria. The winning goal gave the U.S. first place in Group C, having scored one more goal in total than England. This is the first time the U.S. has won a group since 1930. Las Vegas Sun reporter Katharine Euphrat caught the moment of rowdy celebration very early Wednesday morning at Crown & Anchor.
Landon Donovan scored off a rebound in the first minute of stoppage time Wednesday, advancing the United States to the second round at the World Cup with a 1-0 win over Algeria.
With the U.S. perhaps three minutes from elimination, Algerian goalkeeper Rais Bolihi stopped Jozy Altidore's shot on a breakaway, but Donovan hustled in and kicked in the rebound to win Group C.
After his U.S. record 44th international goal, Donovan joyously ran to the corner flag and his teammates ran down the touchline to mob him. Donovan was in tears when the game ended and the United States had moved into the second round.
In the middle of the celebration was Las Vegas' Herculez Gomez, a forward for the United States who started and played the first half. Gomez, 28, was a surprise addition to the team in late May, going from a relative unknown to playing on soccer's biggest stage.
With just its fifth shutout in World Cup play, the United States (1-0-2) won a World Cup group for the first time since 1930 and will face the Group D runner-up this weekend.
England (1-0-2), which beat Slovenia moments earlier, also had five points but finished second because the U.S. scored four goals to two for the English. Slovenia (1-1-1) was third with four points, failing to advance because of Donovan's heroics, and Algeria (0-2-1) was last with one.
Until Donovan's goal, it appeared the officiating again would be the focus.
Clint Dempsey put the ball in the net in the 21st minute off the rebound of a Gomez shot. But the goal was called off for offsides. It was the second such non-goal for the United States in as many games, as Maurice Edu's late goal that would have given the Americans a victory against Slovenia last week was disallowed. Replays appeared to show Dempsey was onside.
Dempsey had another great chance in the 57th minute when Michael Bradley stole the ball and sent Altidore streaking down the right side. Altidore crossed, but Dempsey's shot hit the goalpost. He shot wide on the rebound.
Gomez, a graduate of Las Vegas High, also played the final 12 minutes of the Americans' 2-2 tie against Slovenia last Friday.
His World Cup journey started this spring when he became the first American-born player to lead Mexico's Premier Division in scoring, tallying 10 goals this year for Puebla F.C.
Discussion: comments so far…
Comments are moderated by Las Vegas Sun editors. Our goal is not to limit the discussion, but rather to elevate it. Comments should be relevant and contain no abusive language. Comments that are off-topic, vulgar, profane or include personal attacks will be removed. Full comments policy. Additionally, we now display comments from trusted commenters by default. Those wishing to become a trusted commenter need to verify their identity or sign in with Facebook Connect to tie their Facebook account to their Las Vegas Sun account. For more on this change, read our story about how it works and why we did it.
Only trusted comments are displayed on this page. Untrusted comments have expired from this story.
No trusted comments have been posted.
Post a comment
Most Popular
- Viewed
- Discussed
- E-mailed
- UNLV can move forward without the burden of losing streak to San Diego State
- A wife’s wisdom shows birth control issue needn’t be divisive
- Surprise links, negotiated deals addressed by commissioners
- Motorcycle accident claims life of man in northeast valley
- Hope and change and … what’s missing?
- New York mayor has the right idea
- We don’t need a CEO in charge
- Paying our own way
- Country has ‘given’ citizens a lot
- Jerry Tarkanian: Mike Moser impresses yet again on a day to remember former Rebel greats
Blogs
The Kats Report
Color from scene at Thomas & Mack: We have a wire job! Rebels win, and Louie Armstrong sings!
South Point owner Michael Gaughan's take on 'Vegas Stripped': 'I'll give it an 8' (4 Comments)
Author relishes writing the life story of ‘larger-than-life’ Oscar Goodman (3 Comments)
Elsewhere
Landowner: All roads could lead to Uxbridge casino
Revel reveals smoke-free casino opening
Cirque du Soleil show in Sands China casino to close this month
Meet the woman behind Sheldon Adelson
The Sun
Locally owned and independent for more than 50 years.
i was sad to see gomez go off for a sub in the second half. he had some wonderful opportunities in the first half. very happy to see a local boy do well.
Wow...what a shock...a 1-0 soccer game
@ vegasparttimer
Wow . . more of a shock that the USA win a game in a World Series that includes teams from outside North America ;-)
Great performances by Donovan and Dempsey and good to see Herculez getting a game.
Enjoy the rest of the world's favourite tournament!
VegasVegas, this is the *Las Vegas* Sun. We cover things that happen in, are related to and affect Las Vegas. A US soccer match that does not involve Herculez Gomez is none of those things, therefore we have not covered the team until now.
That is great! Great that the US team advances and great that we get to see one of LV's own in the game!
Odd that a user with the handle VegasVegas would object to the local angle... oh well, it takes all kinds I guess.
What do you expect VegasVegas? Herc started, USA won it's first game in this years World Cup. Is the correlation to much for you to process? Regardless of whether or not he impacted the game winning goal, he had an impact on the game. What else is the sports media going cover right now? NBA finals just ended, every football team in the NFL and most sportswriters that cover it are on vacation, and baseball is about as interesting as watching paint dry.
Get em Levi
Surprised if any of you lot could sit and watch a game for 92 minutes. As for the 1-0 soccer game comment yeah 86-87 would have been soooo much more fun - Muppet. And for those who have never ventured out of your State....there are more than 32 Countries in the World you know and we all watch FOOTball.
For those more open minded - USA played an excellent open game and deserve qualification. Confederations Cup shows how well US football has progressed. Beats Rounders.
Muy bien por Hercules Gomez!! Not bad for a Las Vegas High graduate-who is just playing soccer and representing his country -the US. Hercules as a member of the US team just helped achieve a historic win against Algeria, a worthy rival -and thanks to the wonder of satelite TV- in front of about 1 billion people!
Vamos Hercules -make Las Vegas, Nevada and the US proud!!
Bape: I an so glad you made that comment. Shows what a nieve, insular, ignorant Nation you can be. Got a Passport have you? Travelled the big World? Don't forget your Nation is built from Immigrants who left mud huts centuries ago.
It would be nice to see Nevada's TV media to -at least- mention and show some appreciation to the efforts of one of our own-Hercules Gomez!!
Thanks SUN for providing this report!! It shows this Newspaper cares for the Hispanic Community
no one in the US watches?! I guess you have never lived on the east coast, futbol has been popular back east for years. US history teaches (I thought) that we are a land of immigrants. Immigrants love futbol, I have seen many a fight in AMERICA between futbol fans playing at parks. Honduras, Jamaica, Ireland, we have many immigrants in the east. how can ppl so insulated from the world make so many generalizations?
AWESOME game, we deserved it in the end! I was so happy for Herculez to get the start today, my wife told me on the news there was a bar full of herculez supporters and his family maybe? What bar was that? I would love to attend it Saturday. Today me and a few friends were at the Santa Fe to hundreds of fans. Go USA!
I couldn't believe how much we attacked today.
Great game.
I guess the ignorant among us can't appreciate anything that doesn't involve thugs(NBA), felons(NFL) and Roid boys(MLB).
Soccer is a game unappreciated by sycophants and posers.
It is a moving chess game, a thing of beauty!
"A US soccer match that does not involve Herculez Gomez is none of those things, therefore we have not covered the team until now."
The US has played a number of soccer matches that involved Herculez Gomez before today. Just the fact that he made the team was highly significant for our community. But better late than never, I suppose. It's great you're covering him at all. VegasVegas is all wet.
As for the comments of those who hate soccer because it's not "American" enough for you or because you find it boring, too bad for you. You all missed out on an incredibly exciting game this morning. Landon, Clint, Herculez, Tim, Jozy, and the rest of our team made me burst with pride the way they never gave up, even in the face of yet another atrocius call that could have cost them the game. The US team has made incredible strides in the last ten years and is representing our country exceptionally well. We should all be proud of these guys. I'll bet when we win a world cup of our own you all will be standing up and cheering along with everyone else. It's great to see our guys beating the rest of the world at their own game.
GO USA! BEAT GHANA!
Too all- You don't have to dis 'soccer' and you don't have to dis America's sports. Both are great. There's dirt in pro soccer as well, so the comments about thugs, steroids, etc is just as naive and ignorant as someone talking about mud huts etc millions in America live in trailer parks.
As a world traveler, I love my home US. I also enjoy both American sports and soccer. Doesn't have to be either/or.
Go USA!
Hercules Gomez, cool, that's a great player.
And doesn't his brother-in-family-name "Mario Gomez" play for the German soccer team?
...small, small world...:)
Way to go, U.S. ...
U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A. - fight and play - U.S.A.
Regards
Banana_Joe
To everyone who says "nobody in the US cares," obviously you are wrong because we are having this discussion. Unfortunately a few egocentric swine don't represent the entire nation. The USA/England soccer game had about 13 million viewers by most estimates. Apparently 13 million = 0?
Again, try stepping outside of your tiny little view of the world and recognize that the U.S. represents only a small portion of the world. U.S. 300 million people, World 6.6 Billion people. EVERYWHERE not named USA or Canada, Soccer is the biggest sport. Sorry there isn't enough scoring to keep you interested... try expanding your attention span.
And along the same lines as what Axiom said: if you don't like soccer, thats fine. Just don't watch and keep your opinion to yourself. I'm not making any room on the bandwagon when some people finally come around.
I like that American soccer style very much, because it slightly differs from the European teams' styles where some from a certain point of time only try to be top scorer of the team.
Not so the U.S. team, they played and fighted together each one to support the other team member and all together for the team's success, which worked out pretty well.
That style of merging some football moves, tactics, tricks with the European soccer style chess moves is awesome and surprising for every competing team.
Some members of the U.S. team also play like civilized Rooneys which is surprising for viewers in a very positive way.
U.S.A., U.S.A., fight and play, U.S.A., U.S.A.
Regards
Banana_Joe
VegasVegas,
99 percent of our stories about the Super Bowl, World Series and Lakers all have been tied to a local community of fans or betting, which is about as Vegas as you can get. We did run a World Cup story that wasn't about Gomez. However, surprise, it was about betting: http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/jun...
While I would argue that US soccer news isn't relevant to EVERYONE (and that's coming from a soccer fan, mind you), those who do find it relevant can find it in any number of places (ESPN, CNN, Fox Sports, Yahoo, etc). If you're looking for Las Vegas news, however, there aren't nearly as many places. So, we focus our efforts and homepage space on stories that appeal to readers coming to us for news about Las Vegas and Clark County. If we happen to get some World Cup fans who find us while searching Google, all the better. But those readers are few and far between, so we like to focus on the topics our everyday readers care about and are affected by.
Hey, come on folks, "Get Over It."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMAv1n8ie...
@VegasVegas:
Las Vegas is NOT central Europe or South-America or South-Africa. Las Vegas is not even East-Coast New York, or have you ever seen a roller coaster running in front of Lady Liberty in real New York? Me either. So, why can you not ACCEPT reality?
Las Vegas is West Coast, and it is located in the desert. Why should Las Vegas focus on same things/topics like central Europe or East-Coast New York? No reason to see.
And it is very attractive for tourists for gamblers, for business people to spend their precious time in Vegas, because Vegas is DIFFERENT from central Europe and the East-Coast.
That's why LV Sun publishes relevant information for West-Coast-LV-in-the-desert people and their shareholders. How hard is that to understand?
Not all of the U.S.A. is West-Coast-in-the-desert. But some companies here in LV have important business partners in East Coast N.Y. who might not be too much interested in a local who became a soccer star. But even gamblers from all over the U.S.A. are interested in the result list of the U.S. soccer team. I bet they do.
U.S.A., U.S.A. - fight and play - U.S.A., U.S.A.
Regards
Banana_Joe
Congrats USA!!!!!
You are deserving play on the next round.
GO USA