CARSON, California (Reuters) - Rodney Wallace scored the only goal of the match in the 65th minute to lift Costa Rica to a 1-0 victory over the United States in an international friendly at the Home Depot Center on Friday.
"Once they scored, they were sitting back and playing on the counter-attack and that made it even more difficult," U.S. coach Juergen Klinsmann told reporters. "They kind of put up a wall with 10 guys in front of the 18-yard box."
Despite enjoying a majority of possession and territorial advantage, Landon Donovan's sixth minute miss from the edge of the area was the home team's best chance of the match.
"Not happy with the result but I'm happy with the performance," Klinsmann said of his second match in charge of the U.S. team.
"I think the players did exactly what we wanted to do. We put them under pressure from the beginning. We had our chances in the first half and if Landon (Donovan) was a little more lucky, he puts it away and then it would have been far easier."
(Reporting by Mike Mouat in Windsor, Ontario. Editing by John O'Brien)
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