Concacaf Gold Cup

Down 2-0 with only 40 minutes remaining in last night’s CONCACAF Gold Cup quarterfinal, Haiti produced a barnstorming comeback to knockout Canada 3-2 while clinching a spot in the semifinals for the first time ever. 

The progress that Canada had evidently made under John Herdman had been one of the talking points of the group stage, and there were whispers of the Canucks upsetting the odds to claim their first continental title since 2000.

Twitter, like Reddit before it, was once a largely satirical, clandestine take on whataboutery — a safe place against the echo chambers of fallacy that invaded popular media sources with the power to turn Mahatma Gandhi into a cynic. In their absurdism, Twitter and Reddit remained far from the trappings of modern media. That’s no longer the case.

Our takes are now dictated by the reactionary, reward-seeking behavior that's seeped into all social platforms, contributing directly to the cacophony of noise that leads to the short-sighted negligence we all, supposedly, abhor.

On Friday night, goalkeeper Eloy Room stood on his head to earn the Curaçao national team its first-ever Gold Cup victory, 1-0 over favored Honduras.

Juriën Gaari did one better on Tuesday night.

In the midst of Women’s World Cup nail-biters and Luis Suarez antics you probably missed it, but Monday night Bermuda quietly made history. With a convincing 2-0 victory over Nicaragua at the Gold Cup, Bermuda, an island nation of about 65,000 people, achieved its first victory ever in a major international competition.

It’s been a vengeful week for U.S. Soccer. Last night at FirstEnergy Stadium in Cleveland, the USMNT romped to a 6-0 victory over Trinidad and Tobago, exacting a small fraction of revenge for that frightful night in Couva. The win came only two days after the USWNT had vanquished its own personal demons by defeating Sweden at the Women’s World Cup.

Take a bow, Eloy Room. The Curaçao goalie set a tournament record with 15 saves to lead his tiny nation of about 160,000 to its first-ever Gold Cup win, 1-0 over Honduras on Friday in Houston. 

The Curaçao keeper was unbeatable to keep Honduras, the group favorite, at bay. In a great moment after the match, Room celebrated with fans of Honduras’ rival, El Salvador.

When the USMNT failed to qualify for the 2018 World Cup, Michael Bradley became a major target of vitriol from U.S. fans. The son of a former coach, Bradley has been booed across the country since that fateful night in Trinidad and Tobago in October of 2017. 

Bradley is too slow, too dumb, too useless, the critics say.

But the career Michael Bradley USMNT stats suggest he deserves more respect than he gets.