If the United States had a golden, nigh-untouchable World Cup run, then South Korea had the exact opposite. They looked woefully unprepared for the tournament, and the big question mark for this game, besides how the US would compensate for their bevy of injured and unavailable players, was if Korea had been working on themselves in the months since the Cup. And it was apparent they had, as they gave the US fairly open end-to-end action in the first 10 minutes or so.
But they couldn’t maintain it, not under the general smothering weight of the US, even a US team that looked like they were half out of step with each other here and there, or flat in their buildup.