General Discussion

First off FIFA is notoriously corrupt and incompetent, from the front office down to their refs. Balogun shouldn't have gotten that red card to begin with, it was a bullshit call on a normal play. In fact it was a play on, no call until VAR "recommended" a review. Other players have done essentially the same action as Balogun did with nothing happening(looking at you Messi).

FIFA rules are confusing to the point of be contradictory when it comes to after action appeals. There have been successful appeals in the group portion of the tournament, but not in the knockout rounds(are they somehow sacred?).

Trump shouldn't have gotten involved, it makes everything the US team does from here on out look illegitimate. He should have kept quiet and said nothing, there was enough pressure on FIFA to change the call as was. Worse thing is if Balogun would have remained disqualified that would have been a rallying point for our team, and as we saw against Bosnia, the US team rallies well. Now this all serves as a rallying point for Belgium, which we don't need. Interesting point, Balogun may still not play as Belgium is appealing the appeal, stay tuned.

I'm still rooting for the US team no matter what happens. They didn't cause this mess, FIFA and Trump did. I'm not going to take my anger out on the people who are caught in the middle. Nor am I going to say that America should be banned from hosting future World Cups. First of all, political leadership changes in this country, and second, FIFA needs a deep cleaning of its own, starting with Infantino.

So go US, sorry you folks got caught in this stupid mess.