U.S. head coach Bob Bradley felt his team were still in the game against Brazil when a late challenge from Sasha Kljestan resulted in a straight red card. Speaking after the game Bradley said: "We had a very nervous, tentative start to the game. An early goal off a set piece really put us in a difficult situation right from the start. In that regard, Brazil is a difficult team to play against always. But when you go down a goal early, when in some ways you follow that up with a bad play on the corner, and they put a counter together, you've really created as hard a situation as you can have. I certainly still felt that in the second half the chance was there. The start of the second half was better, more lively and more determined. Again, a red card in the second match in a row is very disappointing. At times players are trying to push harder, but in the end make a rash decision and it ends up hurting the team for the rest of the game.

"When we look at both games, we still felt the game against Italy as a whole was a good effort. Now it's a short turnaround before the second game, and there is always that extra challenge when you lose the first game in this type of competition to be able to quickly regroup and understand how important the second game is. Certainly by the way we started the match tonight, that is one of the most important lessons. We remind the team sometimes that you can qualify for the World Cup, you can work and do all the right preparation, but that doesn't guarantee that the first game of the World Cup is going to go your way, and in that moment you need to have the experience of understanding how to keep going. We will need to look hard at this and use it in the right way."