Oh, so now he believes that we will win.
All it took was one win, one tie that should have been a win, and one loss that felt like a win to convince Jurgen Klinsmann his United States national team has a kicker’s chance at hoisting the World Cup trophy in two weeks’ time.
“Every single day we’re going to have on the knockout stage, can we do it? Yes we can,” Klinsmann told reporters Friday.
The optimism from Team USA’s enigmatic German-born coach was a complete turnaround from the hopeless appraisal he gave this winter in comments published in the New York Times the week before the tournament — much to the dismay of a nation looking to rally around an underdog squad.
“We cannot win this World Cup, because we are not at that level yet,” Klinsmann said in December. “For us, we have to play the game of our lives seven times to win the tournament.
“Realistically, it is not possible.”
A stirring trio of performances to escape the Group of Death — the victory over Ghana on John Brooks’ miracle header, the last-minute draw against Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal bunch and Thursday’s didn’t-matter 1-0 setback versus Germany — has turned that impossible task into something vaguely more possible.
The latest odds from British sports book Ladbrokes, for instance, have taken the U.S. number down the board to 80-1 from a pre-tournament bet of 250-1.
While the cynic might say Klinsmann had shrewdly managed expectations with his initial straight-talk, his latest round of rhetoric is more distinctly American in tone: Four more wins.
“This is now one of the benchmarks,” he said Friday. “We want to be one day in the top 10, top 12 of the world. So if we want to be there, this is now the moment.”
First up: A Round of 16 test against a young, fleet Europe-tested Belgium team Tuesday in Salvador. Then, perhaps, a quarterfinal clash with Lionel Messi and Argentina. And, eventually, in Klinsmann’s wildest dream, a spot in the final — a rematch against Germany!? — on July 13 in Rio de Janeiro.
“I think if everybody goes to his own personal limit in the context of the team, we’re going to go further in this tournament,” Klinsmann said.
“But you’ve got to realize that moment. So I asked everybody, all the players to make sure that all their flights are booked after July 13.
“That’s just how you have to approach a World Cup, no matter what happens now. You can always change your flights, so start with the end in mind. The end is July 13.”