Pulisic’s goal still to return Saturday

Hurt U.S. hero ‘feeling better’

RAYYAN, Qatar — Two days after suffering a “very painful” pelvic injury, U. S. soccer star Christian Pulisic on Thursday said he is aiming to return for the World Cup round-of-16 match Saturday against the Netherlands.

In his first comments since suffering what team officials described as a pelvic contusion while scoring the only goal against Iran on Tuesday, Pulisic described taking a knee to the groin area from Iran’s goalkeeper.

“My opportunity was there to beat the defender to the ball, and I was able to do that — and paid the price for it a bit,” he said. “It was not nice, but obviously very painful. But feeling better, feeling better.”

Pulisic was planning to meet with the medical staff before deciding whether to practice with the team Thursday night. Initially open to reporters, the training session was later closed.

Thursday’s matches

• Japan and Spain both advanced to the round of 16 even with Japan’s 2-1 win against La Roja in the Group E finale. The Samurai Blues rallied with two second- half goals. That left Germany out despite a 4- 2 win against Costa Rica, losing out to Spain on goal difference.

• Morocco finished on top of Group F with a 2-1 win against Canada to advance to the knockout rounds for the first time since 1986. Croatia also advanced to the round of 16 with a 0-0 tie against Belgium.

Female officials

French referee Stephanie Frappart became the first woman to take charge of a men’s World Cup game on Thursday as she blew her whistle to start Germany’s game against Costa Rica.

Frappart also had two women as assistants — Neuza Back of Brazil and Karen Diaz Medina of Mexico — to complete an all- female refereeing team on the field.

Kathryn Nesbitt, a Pitt alumna, of the United States was also working at the Al Bayt Stadium as the offside specialist in the video review team.

FIFA has two other women, Salima Mukansanga of Rwanda and Yoshimi Yamashita of Japan, on its list to referee games at the tournament in Qatar.

Belgium coach exits

Roberto Martinez is leaving as coach of Belgium’s national team after Thursday’s World Cup exit. Martinez coached Belgium to a third-place finish at the 2018 World Cup.

He was in charge of the team for six years.

TV ratings

The United States’ 1-0 win against Iran that was seen by nearly 15.5 million people on U. S. English- and Spanish-language broadcasts and digital streams.

The game was viewed by 12,013,000 on Fox, including 954,004 digital streams, the most for a World Cup match for the network. That was up from 521,715 streams for the 0-0 draw between U.S. and England on Black Friday and 511,822 for the Americans’ opening 1-1 tie with Wales on Nov. 21.