John Brooks enjoyed what will likely go down as the greatest moment of his career on Monday when he scored the game-winning goal for the USA against Ghana. The perfect header was the type of play that Brooks, who is a reserve player, could only dream about. And he did.
After Brooks instantly became a hero, he told reporters that scoring the game-winner was literally a dream come true.
“It is a great moment for me,” he said, via Martin Rogers of Yahoo Sports. “It’s unbelievable that I had a dream about it. I told some teammates that I would score in the 80th minute and win the game and I did it — in the 86th minute. The dream was two days ago, and it was also a header from a corner.”
The corner kick was taken by Graham Zusi, who also came on as a substitute. US coach Jurgen Klinsmann managed a perfect game and put the right players on the pitch when they needed to be there. Brooks said he remembered the dream as soon as he scored.
“I just ran in the box and hoped that it would come to my head,” he said. “I remembered the dream right after I scored. I hadn’t thought about it before then. When I came in I just wanted to do simple things right. In the first few moments I was very nervous.
“This was the first dream like that I’ve had. Hopefully it is not the last.”
Brooks probably never could have dreamed that his Wikipedia page would praise him for being a great American or a major news publication would create this headline about him, but he deserves all the credit. Without his goal, the US’s chances of advancing through the “Group of Death” would be even more slim.
H/T SI Hot Clicks
