Gold Cup 2015: Key Tactical Battles, Predictions for Friday's Group a Matches

The 2015 Gold Cup continues on Friday, as the four teams in Group A prepare for their second match of the competition. The United States will come face-to-face with Haiti, just hours after Honduras and Panama do battle in Foxborough, Massachusetts.

The USA remain the favourites to win Group A and sit in the lead after their 2-1 win over Honduras, while Panama and Haiti played out a 1-1 draw in their meeting. The outlook for the knockout stages should be a lot clearer after Friday's matches, so let's have a look at some of the key tactical battles and make some predictions.

USA vs. Haiti

The Yanks got their Gold Cup campaign off to a winning start, but their performance against Honduras was anything but impressive. Honduras dominated possession for large stretches of the match and sapped all of the creativity out of the American squad, which scored both goals from set pieces.

One player stood out for Honduras: Andy Najar. The Anderlecht winger was a handful for the American defence, and Timothy Chandler in particular struggled to contain him.

NBC Sports' Andy Edwards thought Najar's impact was perhaps the biggest takeaway from the entire match:

Haiti don't field a player of Najar's quality, but the winger highlighted one weakness the Stars and Stripes have, and one Haiti can exploit: The defenders struggle to contain fast runners coming right at them.

Howler shared this Vine of one particular action, and while it's an impressive move from Najar's part, he should never be allowed to come anywhere near the box in this situation:

The Haitians lack the technical skills that make Najar dangerous, but they're fast. They break well on the counter-attack, and against the favoured Americans, they will have no issues digging their defence in a little deeper and waiting for the spaces to open up.

Manager Jurgen Klinsmann knows he can't afford to underestimate Haiti, as reported by Sports Illustrated's Brian Straus:

We talked the players through that already in training and we just had a team meeting about Haiti. It is a team full of individual quality. If you look at their roster and if you look at the places where they play, quite a lot of them play in Europe. I think Panama got that lesson and we have to make sure that we’re not getting caught on the wrong foot here.

There's no denying Chandler struggled the most against Honduras, and Najar in particular, an unfortunate development after the 25-year-old showed so much promise during friendlies leading up to the tournament.

So far, he's looked either very good or very poor for the national team, leading to this observation from The Best Soccer Show's Jared DuBois:

Chandler will have plenty of chances to convince Klinsmann and the fans he deserves to be the regular starter, but against the speedy Haitians, it may not be such a bad idea to leave him out of the starting XI. Perhaps DeAndre Yedlin, a speedster himself, will fare better.

Final Prediction: USA 3-1 Haiti

Honduras vs. Panama

Panama traditionally do well in this competition, having made the final in two of the last five editions, but the squad got off to a false start against Haiti. The Haitians put up a good fight, perhaps better than most would have expected, but their late equaliser was the direct result of a Panama defence that lost focus; that can't happen against Honduras.

On paper, Honduras are the second-best team in Group A, which they demonstrated against the USA. Oscar Boniek Garcia is expected to be healthy in time to make the bench, and the duo of Najar and Anthony Lozano gives the side plenty of options in the attacking third.

So how do you stop Honduras? You don't―you let them stop themselves. Los Catrachos play a very physical game, routinely going over the edge, and the defenders in particular have a tendency to lose focus and set their team back when things aren't going their way.

A perfect example was the 2014 World Cup match against France in which Wilson Palacios allowed himself to lose control, turning his match into a personal battle with Paul Pogba that ended up costing his team, via the Irish Times Sports' Stuart James:

That's just one example, but Honduras continue to do this every time they run into early trouble. They were overly aggressive at times against the USA, and if Panama challenge them, they will be overly aggressive on Friday. And when they become aggressive, they tend to lose focus.

If Panama want to shock Honduras, the likes of Luis Tejada have to apply high pressure on the centre-backs and see whether they can handle it. Given their tendency to crack, that's where the weaknesses lie. But if it doesn't work and Honduras can build from the back and get the ball to their forwards, this match won't be a contest.

Final Prediction: Honduras 2-0 Panama

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