USA vs. Panama 2017 live blog: Scores, highlights, and news from World Cup qualifier

Neither team is going to be terribly disappointed with that result. It was a sloppy game, and a draw leaves both feeling OK about qualifying for the World Cup. Here’s a recap of the game.

90’ — Both teams pushing harder for a winner than you might think, given that a draw is an OK result for both of them. Neither seems particularly afraid of giving up a goal.

82’ — Jozy Altidore is the third American to be substituted, and he had a frustrating day. The USMNT couldn’t get him the ball very often. He’s been replaced by youngster Paul Arriola, who was called up as an injury replacement for this team.

Panama wants a target man on, and takes off Torres for Abdiel Arroyo.

79’ — Howard has to make another save, and again he’s up for the challenge. Godoy takes a rip from 20 yards and gets some good power on it, but the American goalkeeper smothers the ball. Less than a minute later, Torres has a chance to shoot from inside the box and misses wide at the near post.

77’ — Having to play your sixth-string right back isn’t great.

74’ — Sub No. 2 for the Americans, and it’s another player to add some athleticism and work rate to the midfield. Kellyn Acosta comes on to replace Jermaine Jones, who struggled tonight, if we’re being honest.

69’ — The USMNT’s first sub is to bring Alejandro Bedoya on for Darlington Nagbe, and that’s puzzling. Nagbe’s probably the only American player who’s done a decent job keeping the ball in this game. Tough to figure out what Arena is thinking with that move.

62’ — As this second half wears on, Panama is piling on more pressure and the USMNT is looking more disorganized. The entire back line is struggling, and they’re not getting any help from Bradley or Jones in front of them. A combination of good play by Howard and poor execution by Los Canaleros is keeping the Americans level.

59’ — Panama misses another big chance! Again, Torres has a chance from eight yards, but Howard steps up to stuff him.

57’ — Gabriel Torres is clean through on goal, but can’t even challenge Howard. Tim Ream does an incredible job to recover and block his shot.

51’ — Decent attack by the Americans. Jorge Villafaña crosses for Pulisic, but Baloy blocks it out for a corner. The USMNT sets up a shot for Nagbe, but he pulls his effort wide.

46’ — And we’re back for the second half. No substitutions for either team, though Arena should probably start thinking about how to solidify his midfield.

HALFTIME — Panama 1-1 USA. Very little action for the first 39 minutes, besides all the uncalled fouls. Then, BOOM, the game sprang to life. Bruce Arena will be upset that his team conceded in the 44th minute — it’s likely changed his halftime plans considerably.

44’ — Panama 1-1 USA, goal! The USMNT defends poorly on a long throw-in. The ball pings around the box off the throw-in and falls for Gabriel Gómez, who equalizes for the hosts. Great throw by Adolfo Machado, but the USMNT should do better than this.

39’ — Panama 1-0 USA, goal! Christian Pulisic beats two men one-on-one on the right flank and squares to Clint Dempsey for a tap-in. Pulisic, perhaps the smallest man on the pitch, refused to get out-muscled by two big, strong dudes — Felipe Baloy and Roman Torres.

36’ -- Panama is pretty mad at a no-call for a Jermaine Jones tackle/foul on Aníbal Godoy, then more mad that Christian Pulisic takes a long time to put the ball out of play so Godoy can get treatment. There’s a lot of pushing and shoving, but no cards. Referee César Ramos is insisting on doing as little as possible.

33’ — Big chance for Panama! Alberto Quintero absolutely skins Zusi on the left flank and creates a shot for himself from 15 yards, but he doesn’t curl it far away enough from Tim Howard and the American goalkeeper is up to the challenge.

32’ — Legitimately the best thing to happen in this game is Omar Gonzalez doing a butt bump.

29’ — First promising move for the Americans, Jones releases Pulisic, but his shot is stopped by Luis Ovalle with an excellent sliding tackle. The resulting corner leads to nothing.

27’ — Panama’s taken up a strategy of hacking the heck out of the USMNT’s smaller, more technical players. It’s working — the Americans haven’t created any shots.

21’ — So the USMNT could certainly be playing better, but a lot of their bad touches and turnovers have to do with the pitch. It’s...

...yeah, basically the surface of the moon.

16’ — The closest thing to a chance for either team has been Panama’s corners. They’ve missed a couple of decent looks.

8’ — This could best be described as a demolition derby so far. Constant turnovers, neither team can string three good passes together and the tackling has been aggressive.

3’ -- The Jones lineup question has been answered. He’s playing the same role as Lletget did. The USMNT has kept their diamond shape.

1’ -- Kickoff! American fans will be happy to learn that The Star Spangled Banner was heartily booed by the Panama City crowd. The Panama crowd display was solid.

9:55 p.m. — Pregame conversation about the USMNT lineup has been centered around how it will function, since one of the changes Arena was forced into due to injury isn’t like-for-like. Jermaine Jones, a true central midfielder, has come in for Sebastian Lletget, a midfielder-winger ‘tweener who was well-suited for doing a little bit of both in a diamond formation.

Is the USMNT going to play the same formation, just with one of their shuttlers playing more narrow? Or is Jones’ introduction going to cause a formation re-shuffle? Keep an eye on Jones’ positioning early in the game.

9:46 p.m. — It’s pretty common for teams playing away in Central America to deal with fans trying to ensure they don’t get a good night’s sleep, and this game is no different. Last night, Panama fans had a little fireworks display at the USMNT hotel.

The Americans won’t be rattled by this. They’ve experienced it many times. Hopefully they got a midday nap in.

Bruce Arena was brought into the United States men’s national team to halt a crisis, and he’s managed to do just that. Last week’s 6-0 win over Honduras was the most impressive USMNT performance in years, and has them in decent shape in the Hexagonal again. Still, they’ll need a result away to Panama on Tuesday night to feel good about their chances to finish top three in CONCACAF qualifying.

Clint Dempsey and Christian Pulisic were the stars of the show on Friday night, putting up truly dominant showings. Dempsey scored a hat trick, while Pulisic scored one of his own while being the USMNT’s primary creative outlet.

Panama lost to Trinidad and Tobago last week, but will still be in decent shape if they avoid defeat in this match. They got four points from their first two qualifying matches and will be a serious challenger to the United States for a qualifying spot.

Injuries have not been kind to the USMNT during this World Cup qualifying cycle. Three starters from the Honduras match — John Brooks, Geoff Cameron and Sebastian Lletget — all miss out due to injury. They’ve been replaced in the lineup by Tim Ream, Graham Zusi and Jermaine Jones. Panama played 4-5-1 in their last game, but they’ve thrown another striker into their team for this game, apparently unafraid of losing the midfield battle.

This is a live blog that will update constantly as the match rolls on, with the newest updates at the top of the page.

United States lineup (4-2-3-1): Tim Howard; Jorge Villafaña, Tim Ream, Omar Gonzalez, Graham Zusi; Michael Bradley, Jermaine Jones; Christian Pulisic, Clint Dempsey, Darlington Nagbe; Jozy Altidore

Panama lineup (4-4-2): Jamie Penedo; Luis Ovalle, Roman Torres, Felipe Baloy, Adolofo Machado; Alberto Quintero, Anibal Godoy, Gabriel Gomez, Armando Cooper; Gabriel Torres, Luis Tejada

The game will be on beIN Sports in English and Telemundo in Spanish. You can watch for free on beIN Sports’ streaming platform beIN Sports Connect if you’re a TV subscriber. If you aren’t their feed is also on subscription services Fubo and Sling. If you’d like to stream in Spanish, head to Telemundo Deportes en vivo.