Rooting for Ecuador

I know this guy will be cheering on Ecuador today.

Native son of Ibarra, Ecuador, the nation's greatest-ever soccer talent, Alex Aguinaga.

Dangerous Ecuadorians

Carlos Tenorio can flat play. He's going to be a handful for the U.S. Also, Ulises De la Cruz is dangerous out of the back.

Ulises De la Cruz, Edison Mendez, Luis Valencia and Giovanny Espinoza are all in the starting lineup and all played four games in the World Cup last summer.

Ecua-gol

I guess I should have written more on Ecuador yesterday instead of an hour before the start of the game. Oh well. Here goes.

Ecuador had never qualified for a World Cup until 2002. They lost their first two games but beat Croatia 1-0 in the final group stage game. It wasn't just a meaningless game either. Had Croatia won, they would have gone through at Italy's expense. Even then, the then-third place Croats couldn't beat a nation who had virtually no international history to speak of.

Ecuador's two all-time greats used to play in Mexico. Alex Aguinaga and Agustin Delgado both helped Necaxa to titles and are both very well-respected in Mexico. But they've moved on now: Aguinaga by choice, Delgado by suspension.

As far as streaks go, Sideline Views' streak of US games ends at two but our streak of watching Ecuador in World Cups is strong. In 2002, I took in Mexico-Ecuador in Sendai while the better half of this outfit took in Ecuador-Costa Rica in Hamburg last summer. That's a streak I wouldn't mind maintaining.