USA hit Paraguay for four and give Inglewood the opener it wanted.

The first half did the damage, and Balogun gave the night its shape.

The U.S. did not need long to turn nerves into noise. Once Paraguay put through their own net, the match tilted toward the home side, and Balogun made sure it stayed there with two first-half finishes that sent the crowd into halftime already thinking bigger.

That was the decisive change from the pre-match questions. The U.S. did not spend the opener waiting for a rhythm to appear. They pressed the issue, found the second and third goals before Paraguay could settle, and made the rest of the night about game management rather than rescue work.

How the match turned

The scoreboard story is clean: USA led 3-0 at halftime, Paraguay found a second-half goal through Mauricio, and Reyna made the final margin 4-1 in stoppage time. That late fourth mattered because it stopped the match from ending with even a hint of unease.

Balogun's brace will be the line people remember first. In a home World Cup opener, the striker gave the U.S. something more useful than a highlight: breathing room. With the crowd already at full volume, the goals let the midfield play forward instead of tightening up around a narrow lead.

The only caution is that Australia will not care how good this looked in Inglewood. Group D now bends in the U.S. direction, but the job is still to carry the sharp start into Seattle rather than treating the opener as proof of anything finished.

What matters next

The next match is Australia on June 19 at Lumen Field in Seattle, with kickoff at 12:00 p.m. UTC-7. A second win would put the U.S. in firm control before the group finale against Turkey back at SoFi Stadium on June 25.

Keep the USA schedule page close for the Australia kickoff and the full Group D path. The broader USA team hub and USA squad page stay connected for the squad picture after this first result.