The U.S. men’s national soccer team was on its merry way to closing out Trinidad and Tobago in the Concacaf Nations League quarterfinals Monday night when Sergiño Dest melted down over a minor matter and put his incredulous teammates in a thorny spot.
Holding a one-goal lead in Monday’s second leg and a four-goal aggregate advantage, the visiting Americans needed only to see things out over the last 51 minutes to secure spots in the tournament’s final four in March and in Copa América, the historic South American competition, next summer.
Despite a 2-1 defeat at Hasely Crawford Stadium in Port-of-Spain, they did meet their objective by prevailing in the two-game series on total goals, 4-2 — “but not in the fashion that we would have wanted,” Coach Gregg Berhalter said.