Say Anything Blog

AP - The U.S. national soccer team is braced for a hostile reception when it faces Mexico for the 50th time, an Easter Sunday World Cup qualifier before more than 100,000 fans in noisy Estadio Azteca.

Landon Donovan remembers the chants of "Osama! Osama!" last year, when the U.S. Olympic soccer team played in Guadalajara.

"It was a little, I guess, humiliating, a little degrading," he said Saturday. "At one point you're surprised and at one point you kind of come to expect it. It's sad, but that's the way it is."

In Mexico, the United States has been treated like a pinata, going 0-21-1 and getting outscored 78-13. But overall the Americans are 6-1-1 in their last eight games against their southern neighbor, getting 11 goals and giving up one. That streak includes a 2-0 victory in the second round of the 2002 World Cup, a game in South Korea that shattered Mexican fans' pride.