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The Czech Republic have beaten the U.S.A 3:0 in Gelsenkirchen .
A goals from Jan Koller and 2 from Tomas Rosicky sealed the win for the Czech’s, who were never really troubled by the U.S.A, but the win was soured by a hamstring injury to their top striker Jan Koller in the first-half.
Koller opened the scoring against the U.S.A in just the 5th minute of the game after Zdenek Grygera crossed a good ball from the right for Koller to head past US keeper Kasey Keller to make it 1:0.
Marek Jankulovski and the captain Tomas Galasek defended the US attacks well, with Brian McBride playing a solo striker role, and being cut out easily.
With their lead, the Czech Republic were quite happy to take their time to build up play in the first-half, and looked dangerous on their attacks.
Pavel Nedved and veteran Karel Poborsky were managing to get the space to deliver a lot of crosses into the area, and forcing some good defending from the US.
Against the run of play, the US captain Claudio Reyna almost equalised in the 28th minute with a shot from outside the penalty area, that beat the Czech keeper Petr Cech, but rebounded off the post and away to safety.
This was as close as Bruce Arena’s team were to get during the first-half, with the Czech back four holding well.
The Czech’s broke through the US defence again in the 36th minute, with an amazing long-range shot from new Tomas Rosicky hammering home the shot from 30-yards, past Keller and into the top corner.
The pressure was all on the US, who were restricted to long-range shots which never troubled the Czech's.
But in the 41st minute, the scorer of the opening goal and their top-scorer, Jan Koller was injured.
Koller fell clutching his right hamstring in the 42nd minute of the first-half, after having scored the opening goal in the match.
He was stretchered off and replaced by Vratislav Lokvenc, who himself is just returning from injury.
The game went into half-time still holding the two-goal lead, but worried about the injury to their prolific striker.
Even without Koller, the Czech Republic continued the second half in command, with Nedved and Rosicky causing the US defence major problems..
Poborsky continued to press down the right wing, and almost added another at the hour mark, but hit the side netting.
Some sloppy play from Reyna almost gave Nedved the chance to set-up a third, but DaMarcus Beasley did well to put the ball out of play, with Oguchi Onyewu also doing well to repel the attacks.
The Czech’s dominated the second half, with Arena’s team finding no way through the solid European defence and looked far more the likely side to score in the second-half.
Halfway through the second-half Rosicky let loose another cannon of a shot, which rattled the crossbar, beating Keller.
The US came close with substitute Eddie Johnson unleashing a fierce shot that went wide after turning well just outside the penalty area, but that was the best shot of the second-half for the US.
Bobby Convey placed a lovely pass through to Eddie Johnson, who was really trying to make his mark on the match, but he failed to make contact and the cross was easily saved by the Czech keeper, who was hardly tested throughout the match.
Nedved and Rosicky were both on fire and it was the Juventus star who placed the ball through to Rosicky, who beat the US defence and finished with a stunning strike to make it 3-0 in the 76th minute.
Despite the huge effort made by Johnson who was a revelation for the US, and the substitution of Josh Wolff on to the pitch, Arena’s team couldn’t find a way through and the game finished 3-0.