United States and Jamaica advance to the Gold Cup Semifinal

The United States and Jamaica have advanced to the 2015 Gold Cup Semifinals to be played on Wednesday, July 22nd. USA posted a 6-0 win over Cuba with Clint Dempsey netting his first national team hattrick. The Houston Dynamo's Giles Barnes put away Jamaica's only goal to advance with a 1-0 defeat of Haiti.

The result leaves only two matches remaining in the quarterfinals, to be played tomorrow in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Trinidad and Tobago will face Panama in the early match at 3:30PM CDT with Mexico versus Costa Rica to follow. The winners of each match will face one another in the second semifinal to be played in Atlanta, GA on Wednesday.

United States and Cuba went about as expected. Missing five players due to defection, Cuba certainly lacked quality to match the US. Michael Bradley and Clint Dempsey were surgical in dissecting the Cuban defense throughout an extremely warm match that even warranted a first half water break. Omar Gonzalez also tallied his first International goal on a corner while Aron Johansson and Gyasi Zardes also found the net.

Jamaica and Haiti, in comparison, was starving for goals. At times end-to-end between the two Caribbean nations, Jamaica was the only one to find the net. In the 7th minute, Giles Barnes would see a last-ditch cross sent by Adrian Mariappa from inches inside of the endline and slotted that ball into the net off the keeper's ankle at a very tight angle. Jamaica managed to hold off the flurry of Haiti's attempts through the remainder of the match and earned a date with the United States in the semifinal.

That match will take place on Wednesday, July 22nd at 5:00PM CDT. The other semifinal, which will be determined tomorrow night, will take place immediately following the United States and Jamaica as part of a Gold Cup doubleheader in Atlanta, Georgia.