Some years ago I was driving down the usual road when all of a sudden a cat darted out in front of me. I had just enough time swerve and miss him. Thing is it had actually been raining that day – raining quite a lot – and the roads were real slick. So next thing I knew I was hydroplaning out of control. Then I spun 180 degrees, slid backwards and smacked into the embankment. When the car finally stopped a single thought came immediately to mind: should have hit that damn cat.

It’s been a long couple of days since the Czech Republic defeated the USA. I’ve had some time to digest it but I keep coming back to the same thought again and again: should have hit the damn cat. That’s the first thing I thought when the whistle blew after 90 minutes. That’s still what I think. Bruce Arena and the USMNT saw that Czech cat dart across the road months ago. They had plenty of time to react. It was natural to react. It was probably the “right” thing to do. You can hardly blame them for reacting. But they did end up turned backwards and smashed up on the side of the road.

We should have hit the damn cat. It still might have been a mess but at least we would have been facing forward at the end of it.