Friedel hoping to escape reality check

The USA, and Blackburn’s favourite adopted World Cup hero, know they are riding the glory wave and that sooner or later there’s a giant reality check about to hit them.

But in Blackburn Rovers’ keeper Brad Friedel’s words: ‘‘Hey, who cares! With this luck maybe reality won’t hit us.’’

The 32-year-old has become the penalty-saving king of the World Cup Finals, pulling off another in the 3-1 defeat by Poland that didn’t stop the USA’s charge into the last 16 - something the Yanks have done only once since 1930, when they were hosts in ’94.

Friedel knows more than most, because of his career in the Premiership, that the reality is that if they can get past bitter local rivals Mexico on Monday in their second-round match, the likelihood is that waiting for them in the quarter-finals in Ulsan will be Germany. Then the glory train might well run out of track.

But for now, Friedel and his mates are basking in well-deserved glory, having clawed their way out of Group D ahead of Portugal and the Poles, leaving South Korea with top spot and the dubious honour of having to confront Italy on Tuesday.

He said: ‘‘This has been a great achievement for us to go through to the second round, and we feel it is better for us to be playing Mexico than Italy.

‘‘We know Mexico inside out, and they no doubt feel the same about us, it’s a real derby for us. Something like Germany playing Holland in European terms.

‘‘It’s worked out great for us even if we lost here.’’

And he refused to accept the cynical European view that the USA won’t get much further.

He added: ‘‘You can’t tell in this tournament what is going to happen. I suppose Europeans watching us are saying that reality will hit us soon with a really big team, but you’ve seen what is happening here, let’s hope reality never kicks in.

‘‘I’d certainly rather play Mexico than Italy, that’s for sure. We got the best deal out of our group.’’

And the Mexico showdown will bring two of the America’s bitterest rivals together for a clash that is too close to call because of the history between the pair.

Friedel said: ‘‘Neither of us I suppose like each other, off the pitch it’s a friendly rivalry but on it the games are not so friendly, and we’ve had a lot of games that have been very, very physical in the past.

‘‘A lot of people in Europe wouldn’t understand the rivalry. When we play them at home we take them to a really cold place to play and when it’s in Mexico they always make us play in the Azteca at noon, with high altitude and smog with the sun beating down at 100 degrees.

‘‘So the results get a little lopsided. We win ours and they win theirs. But this is neutral and the last time we played Mexico in such circumstances we beat them in the Copa America, albeit on penalties. Hopefully we can produce the same result again.’’

He added: ‘‘We play Mexico in most qualifiers home and away and a fair few friendlies.

‘‘I’ve done pretty well against them. I recall a 0-0 draw in Mexico City and that win in the Copa America, they are special results.

‘‘We’ve had a big wake-up call with our performance and result against Poland.

‘‘Maybe Mexico will still be feeling pretty good about themselves and that could be to our advantage.

‘‘I’m obviously pleased with another penalty save, but it would have been better if we had not lost the game.’’

And the emotional clash with the Poles, with so much riding on the result and dependant on Portugal not beating the Koreans at Incheon, will go down in American soccer folklore.

Friedel explained: ‘‘To give anybody a two-goal start makes life very difficult, but we never gave up and in the end we had the luck to get us through.

‘‘We obviously knew that Korea had scored in Incheon, it was hard not to know with all the noise from the Koreans in the stadium.

‘‘We could see our coaches clapping and jumping about on the bench so we sort of guessed things were starting to go our way.

‘‘But it wasn’t until really late on in the match we began to get the message that Korea were still ahead and looking like holding on for the win.

‘‘We knew that was our hope and it was a strange feeling knowing there was nothing we could do about it but just wait and hope.’’

Mexico, meanwhile, are still basking in the achivement of knocking three-time champions Italy into second place in their group.

Indeed the Mexicans were only five minutes away from going through with a 100% record before Alessandro Del Piero clinched a 1-1 draw for the Azzurri.

Coach Javier Aguirre warned: ‘‘We have always had the technical ability, it was just a matter of making the players believe in themselves.

‘‘More than gaining respect, the team has gained confidence.’’

And Aguirre revealed they will be on a revenge mission against the Americans in Jeonju on Monday.

‘‘They beat us last time, so I would love to beat them,’’ he said. ‘‘There is always a great rivalry between us so I am looking forward to it.’’