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For folks fortunate enough to be able to take an extra day or two off around the Christmas holiday, Wednesday provided plenty of soccer for the American sports fan with $5 to spare for an ESPN+ subscription. With beIN Sports providing free Ligue 1 coverage and ESPN+ streaming the Carabao Cup, DFB Pokal and Serie A, it was difficult to figure out which matches to watch.
I feel pretty good about choosing the barnstorming AC Milan-Lazio battle in Serie A over the Everton-Manchester United match for which Edinson Cavani is lucky didn’t have VAR. I’m certainly glad I missed whatever the heck this was between PSG and Strasbourg.
Should Cavani have been sent off for this? pic.twitter.com/PJ7rJD1Mo5
— ESPN FC (@ESPNFC) December 23, 2020
Very normal footballing going on here... pic.twitter.com/XZtYOpSDGu
— beIN SPORTS USA (@beINSPORTSUSA) December 23, 2020
But I did miss the opportunity to watch live as two USMNT players notched one last goal in 2020.
Timothy Weah and Josh Sargent both were on target on Wednesday, both helping their teams to victories to finish the year on a high note. Weah struck in the 23rd minute of Lille’s 3-2 win over Montpellier at about the same time as Sargent scored the second in Werder Bremen’s 3-0 win over Hannover 96.
Weah, like so many of us, had a tough 2020. He missed most of last season with injury and had a slow start to the season at Lille this campaign. However, he appears to be picking up steam heading into 2021.
The 20-year-old American winger was on the score sheet off the bench against Dijon on Dec. 16 and played half an hour in Lille’s 0-0 draw with his old club PSG on Sunday. Given a chance to start in Lille’s final match of 2020, Weah scored for the second time in eight days. Picked out by a brilliant pass from Xeka, Weah did well to fire quickly past the onrushing goalkeeper to put his side into the lead.
Weah scores yet another goal for Lille!@usmntonly pic.twitter.com/5WXAQ2Yg77
— Aubie Anderson #AverageChristmas (@AubieAnderson) December 23, 2020
Add in a strike against another of his former clubs Celtic in the Europa League and that’s three goals in five matches for Weah to finish 2020. Not a bad run of form as we enter the new year.
Meanwhile in Germany, Sargent, born two days before Weah, scored his first goal since Halloween in the DFB Pokal on Wednesday.
Similar to Weah’s goal, Sargent received the ball after staying just onside and kept his composure to beat the keeper.
Sure, it was against lower-tier competition, but Sargent will take what he can get after going six matches without a goal. Sarge now has two goals in the Pokal this season.
With most leagues heading into a winter/Christmas break, these might be the final goals from Americans abroad in 2020. Christian Pulisic will fancy his chances to score against Arsenal on Saturday while Sergiño Dest and Konrad de la Fuente have a chance when Barcelona takes on Eibar next week. After that, it’ll be time to ring in a new year, one that surely won’t suck as much as 2020.
