ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) – Jesús Ferreira gained U.S. citizenship on Dec. 16, 2019, and made his debut for the American national team last Feb. 1. Then he struggled through his second season with Dallas with one goal in 19 Major League Soccer matches. “Obviously kind of upset,” he said. “I took it as you have to do better. You have to make sure that 2021 is a way better year than the past two years.” Ferrieira scored his first two international goals and had three assists, leading the United States over a rusty Trinidad and Tobago 7-0 in an exhibition on Sunday night. Paul Arriola and Jonathan Lewis scored twice each for a U.S. roster missing its Europe-based players. Coming off a 6-2 win over Panama in November with top American players and a 6-0 rout of El Salvador last month with a group mostly from MLS, the U.S. outshot the Soca Warriors 19-2 and scored five goals for a third straight game for the first time. The last time three Americans scored two goals in a game was an 8-1 rout of the Cayman Islands in a 1993 friendly led by Joe-Max Moore, Dominic Kinnear and Mark Chung. “It wasn’t a World Cup qualifying-caliber team based on who they had available,” U.S. coach Gregg Berhalter said of Trinidad and Tobago, “but nonetheless, it was good to see the focus.” Ferreira was born in Santa Marta, Colombia, and grew up in Barranquilla the son of David Ferreira, a midfielder who scored three goals in 39 international appearances for Colombia. He moved to Texas when his dad played for Dallas in MLS from 2009-13, and the family remained there even when his father switched clubs starting in 2014. He played in the Dallas academy, made a brief pro debut in 2017 and spent 2018 on loan with the Tulsa Roughnecks of the second-tier United Soccer League. Berhalter used…
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