Thirty-nine days before the U.S. National Team’s 1990 World Cup opener against Czechoslovakia, Eric Wynalda scored a half-volley in the seventy-fifth minute to lead the U.S. to a 1-0 victory over the United German Hungarians in a friendly in Oakford, Pa.
Many outsiders at the time found it disturbing that a World Cup qualifier nudged past a local Philadelphia amateur team. The U.S. had Tony Meola, Tab Ramos, Bruce Murray, and Wynalda, all destined to become national soccer icons. But UGH were no ordinary amateur side, and had the U.S. possessed a viable professional league, many of their players could have been wearing white on that hot May night in Oakford, Pennsylvania.