Can the USMNT win in Mexico? Former Union star Maurice Edu has done it before.

If you want an expert witness on how the U.S. men’s soccer team can win its big World Cup qualifying game at Mexico on Thursday, you’re going to struggle.

The U.S. men have never won a qualifier at Mexico City’s fabled Estadio Azteca, the 87,500-seat soccer cathedral where the game will take place. So in truth, no one can say how to do it.

But if you want someone who has won a game at the Azteca in a U.S. jersey, the answer lies in a surprising place: the Union’s history books.

On Aug. 15, 2012, the U.S. and Mexico played a prime-time friendly at the place Mexicans call El Coloso de Santa Úrsula, for the Santa Úrsula suburb over which the stadium towers. The game was set up for profit as much as competitiveness, and kicked off just days after El Tri’s under-23 team won gold at the London Olympics. The fans in attendance expected another commanding win.

The opposite happened. With future Union star Maurice Edu and former Union original Michael Orozco playing big roles, the Americans walked out of the Azteca with a 1-0 win.

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It was the first U.S. victory in the building that hosted the 1970 and 1986 men’s World Cup finals, and decades of rivalry heartbreak. Edu played start to finish at centerback, and Orozco Fiscal scored the goal in the 80th minute after entering as a substitute in the 77th.

Seven months later, on March 26, 2013, Edu was part of a U.S. team that secured a scoreless tie at the Azteca, just the second American tie in the building after a scoreless game in 1997. The next time the U.S. went to the Azteca for a qualifier, it earned a 1-1 tie on June 11, 2017.

On Thursday night, Edu will be back at the Azteca, this time in a broadcast booth to call the game for CBS. He still vividly remembers those 2012 and 2013 games, and what it took to silence the big crowds around him — 56,000 for the 2012 friendly, and a full house for the 2013 qualifier.

“For us to go there and know what winning there does — what scoring a goal there does, first and foremost — but then to actually get a result there? It’s incredible,” Edu told The Inquirer this week. “We all went into that game with that mindset of like, ‘[bleep] it, let’s go out there and try to win this game.’ And then to get that victory, to see the way that crowd was silenced and [annoyed], and obviously, the way their team was deflated in that moment as well, there’s no better feeling.”

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Five players from the U.S. squad that went to the Azteca in 2017 are on the squad that will be there Thursday night: Kellyn Acosta, Paul Arriola, Jordan Morris (who didn’t play in the game), Christian Pulisic, and DeAndre Yedlin. Edu believes that will help the team as a whole deal with the frenzy around them — and be ready for Mexico City’s 7,200-foot altitude.

“That’s a variable that’s hard to really explain other than to tell ‘em, ‘You’re gonna struggle to breathe,’” Edu said. “You can try to shape their imagination in some ways, but they won’t get a full understanding until they’re thrown in the midst of it.”

When Pulisic was asked about the Azteca stage at a news conference Wednesday, he said, “There’s nothing massive that these guys aren’t going to be ready for.”

“Of course, we’re aware of the altitude — some guys may be more used to it than others,” the Hershey native added. “But it’s going to be a battle no matter what. So I think at the end of the day, it’s another game that we need to be ready for, and we’re going to compete and try to win.”

That leads to another big talking point. The U.S. doesn’t actually need a win Thursday, with two games to come afterward. A tie plus a win at home over Panama on Sunday would finish the job before next Wednesday’s game at Costa Rica.

But is this U.S. team wired to play for a tie? Will manager Gregg Berhalter be willing to sacrifice three points for one, especially if it means he can rotate his squad some and have his top players at full strength for the home game?

He sure didn’t sound like it Wednesday.

“We want to win all three games,” Berhalter said. “We take it one game at a time, and we’re going to put a team on the field in Mexico that’s going to try to win the game.”

There were also, though, some moments when he turned the podium into a poker table.

“I think any lineup-related questions, my stock answer is just going to be we’re working through it — even if we had made a decision,” Berhalter said at one point. At another, he said he’d read some commentary about the merits of playing backups against Mexico, and took the idea to his staff.

“We debated it, we looked at all sides of it,” Berhalter said. “I think it was an important exercise to do for us … We came out with our answer and you’ll see tomorrow. But certainly, there’s no harm in looking at both sides of this thing.”

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Edu put all his cards on the table.

“You play for a win, ultimately,” he said. “If you come up and it finishes that you just get a point, then you’re happy with that. But there’s no way that you go in with the mindset of trying to get a draw … that’s how you lose games.”

The Americans also know how much pressure there is on Mexico right now. Both teams have 6-2-3 records (21 points), trailing first-place Canada (7-0-4, 25 points). The U.S. holds second place over Mexico on the goal difference tiebreaker, with a three-goal cushion.

El Tri manager Gerardo “Tata” Martino’s seat is scorching-hot. If he loses to the Americans for a fourth straight time — after last year’s Nations League final, Gold Cup final, and World Cup qualifier in Cincinnati — the Mexican media will erupt, even if El Tri qualifies for Qatar in its last two games.

“I think this Mexico team will be under even more pressure, the way that qualifying has gone for them, for Tata, for this group of players,” Edu said. “If they were to not pick up a win at home … that’s a massive, massive smack in the face for them.”

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