The U.S. men’s national team has learned its group stage opponents for the 2024 Copa America.
Uruguay, Panama, and Bolivia will oppose the USMNT in next summer’s tournament in U.S. soil. The 2024 Copa America will feature 10 CONMEBOL nations and six CONCACAF representatives during the competition.
The Copa America will take place from June 20 – July 14 across 13 American cities.
“It’s a tough group,” USMNT head coach Gregg Berhalter said. “I think any group that was going to be drawn was going to be difficult. Copa America is a very difficult tournament. For us, we’re excited to finally know our competitors. Now, it’s about planning our game plans and getting ready to compete.”
The USMNT opens group stage play against Bolivia on June 23 at AT&T Stadium in Dallas, Texas. Panama will face the Americans on June 27 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta before the USMNT concludes its group stage schedule on July 1 against Uruguay at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.
Mercedes-Benz Stadium will open the competition on June 20 with 2022 FIFA World Cup champion Argentina meets the winner of the Canada vs. Trinidad and Tobago play-in match. Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida will host the tournament final.
Argentina are defending Copa America champions after winning the 2021 edition over rivals Brazil.
Here is a closer look at the full groups for the 2024 Copa America:
Group A: Argentina, Peru, Chile, Canada-Trinidad & Tobago Playoff Winner
Group B: Mexico, Ecuador, Venezuela, Jamaica
Group C: USA, Uruguay, Panama, Bolivia
Group D: Brazil, Colombia, Paraguay, Costa Rica-Honduras Playoff Winner
Unless we go 0-3 GB will definitely be the coach in 2026….
P.S. Even if we go 0-3 GB will definitely be the coach in 2026
If the US can’t beat Jamaica on home soil…..strike 1. If they can’t beat Bolivia and Panama strikes 2&3.
Gregg has to obtain results in the NL and Copa. Losing to Brazil in a tight game is understandable but honestly anything less than an appearance in NL final and a quarterfinal loss in Copa should be immediate termination. $ are you kidding me we are hosting 2026 and that must be a quarterfinal or beyond goal. Shit we made it to the quarterfinals in 2002. Are we just treading water?
This should be the litmus test for Gregg: semifinal or better he stays, anything less we need to move on and get fresh new ideas while we still have a bit of time.
I’m not sure that’s fair. If you play Brazil in the quarters a team we’ve beat once in 20 some tries that seems harsh. If we struggle to get out of the group against Bolivia and Panama (neither are traditionally great away from home) and don’t compete with Uruguay and get blown out in quarters it should be considered but not a set in stone benchmark. Don’t forget we have NL in March a poor showing there should shorten the leash.
@johnny – sure it’s not fair but at the end of tbe day on home soil with a much deeper squad than JK had in his Copa we need to perform. We need to stop making excuses. A great coach finds a way with his team in tournaments with a decent team. Our target should be 1st in the group and semis. Results are all that count truly. Copa America will be the closest thing we have to world cup level competitive rehearsal so any under achievement is unacceptable with the WC at home looming.
Johnny, Mat, and IV,
Personally, I agree with IV on this one…with a caveat.
The Copa America is a dry run for the WC, so it’s time for Berhalter to prove that he is up to snuff and has earned the opportunity to lead the USMNT after Copa America and into the WC. With this in mind, the finals should be the goal, but if we bow out in the semis, I think we can call it a success…on the surface. The details ( team selection, formation, tactics, both in advance of the game, and during the game, in game adjustments, etc. ) will be additional info that will need to be considered respective to Berhalter keeping the position.
Mat speaks the truth, on various levels and with the multiple points he shared…
— semifinal or better he stays, anything less we need to move on and get fresh new ideas while we still have a bit of time.
— We need to stop making excuses. A great coach finds a way with his team in tournaments with a decent team. Our target should be 1st in the group and semis. Results are all that count truly.
— JK though for all his faults he found ways to overachieve on the bigger stages.
Johnny, months until the Copa America kicks off, so a lot can change, but as of now, Brazil is not playing well and relative to their history, are at an all time low, so why does Berhalter get a pass if he cannot beat them in the semis?
…correction, why does Berhalter get a pass if he cannot beat Brazil in the quarters?
JR,
Gregg is not getting fired regardless of how awful the USMNT plays in Copa America.
I don’t believe the powers that be have an alternative to Gregg that would be a significant improvement.
Hiring Emma Hayes might well mean the USWNT will win the next Women’s World Cup. And that would be money well spent.
But there is no one out there, no Klopp or Pep, who can promise the same thing for the USMNT. So that would be big money flushed down the toilet.
So they will stick with Gregg, who makes walking around money.
By the time Copa America is over Gregg may wish that they had fired him.
“I’m not sure that’s fair. If you play Brazil in the quarters a team we’ve beat once in 20 some tries that seems harsh.”
If you really believe that then why is the USMNT even in this tournament?
They historically have a poor record vs every CONMEBOL power.
You don’t think Bielsa is not able and willing to try to rip the USMNT a new one? I don’t know how Bolivia will do but Panama is the last CONCACAF team the USMNT would want to face. They certainly are not afraid of the USMNT.
Papi, because Brazil are significantly more talented. Managers are realistic if you fire Berhalter for losing to Brazil, no one is going to want that job. They are going to say that Fed has seriously delusional expectations I’m going somewhere where I have talent and I have some leeway to make mistakes. Why did the US candidate pool consist of guys like Viera and Henry? Because the top managers knew they couldn’t compete for Copa Americas and World Cup titles. Our talent is not at top 8 levels it just isn’t. If they play well in the group and lose 2-1 to Brazil in the quarters you can’t fire the manager. If they draw Panama for 2nd in the group and advance because they lost 3-1 to Uruguay and Panama lost 4-0 then get trashed 4-0 to Brazil, it’s time to a reassess the formula. If we finish 3 or 4 in NL in March then that grace in the group stage shrinks further.
Johnny,
I hear ya, but I believe you are giving Brazil too much credit, which may stem from looking at Brazil the opponent from a historical standpoint and not based on their current form. In their current iteration, they are not playing well and are without a HC. For context, Venezuela just tied Brazil, in Brazil. I recognize the summer of 2024 is 6 months out, but given Venezuela’s result vs Brazil, why can’t Berhalter and the USMNT be expected to beat Brazil?…regardless of what round it is?
In regards to other coaching options…ideally, I would like a top-tier HC, but if they are not available, there are plenty of other options out there, who are not top-tier, that would be an upgrade over Berhalter.
So, it is time for Berhalter to prove that he has earned to right to continue forward as HC of the USMNT, and he has to do that by moving the needle, and not just a little, but noticeably, and that comes through success and winning. Klinsmann made it to the semis in 2016, and while I set the minimum threshold at making it to the finals, given the aforementioned about Kllinsmann and the 2016 team, why is anything less than making the semis in 2024 acceptable?
Make no mistake about it, I’m not advocating for change just for the sake of change, but more so, if results are not produced, it is time for a change away from Berhalter.
i don’t think semis means that much. JK made the semis and while i thought it was pitiful in some corners that was success. soon after, fired.
i think if we have aspirations it should be final or bust. are we seriously trying to improve things or are we just wanting to say the right things and put on a show before losing? in terms of trying to elevate this, i think we talk it but don’t walk it so i am sure semis or a harsh quarter matchup suffice. reflecting the fanboy idea that just being at copa will rub off. this is going nowhere until we win that brazil or argentina game sometimes — as we once did. that will happen when our goal is winning every game and sorting out each time what that takes and actually doing it. that doesn’t get done indulging folks with “but that’s a tough opponent” or “semis at this tournament is ok.” it needs to be, we’re here to win, and if we don’t, changes will be made. players will lose jobs. the formation may shift. we will not just do the same thing over and over and arrogantly expect results. while in contradiction excusing losses as we had no business winning that game anyway. which is it?
@JV – one thing about JK though for all his faults he found ways to overachieve on the bigger stages. The semi at Copa sure but for me more impressive the WC with the hardest group we ever had – portugal with ronaldo, germany who won it all and a strong ghana side. Somehow we got out of that group and were a Wondo sitter away from beating a Belgium with their golden generation.
Losing to Messi lead Argentina was pitiful?
re “tough group,” i really don’t think so, but i am ambivalent about whether it’s worth critique. does anyone with a friendly draw really admit that? that’s bulletin board material. you talk the opponents up whether it’s argentina or bolivia and get ready. but i reacted nonetheless and it’s probably i have so little faith in the man i can’t tell if he is mouthing platitudes or really believes it. this isn’t gold cup, there never is a cake walk in copa.
i think his default system doesn’t work. i think he is sufficiently inconsistent when he tries to improvise one-off game plans that he fairly often has a wales second half or holland debacle. i think if he wants to win this or anything else he needs to sit down, figure out how he would beat argentina and the like, work from there. i think we go about this backwards and pick personnel and tactics where the proof of concept is they worked against ghana on their lousy night, or against some weak opponent in gold cup. my select coach’s theory was some idea he had, wasn’t proven til it won a game with our league rival. the excuses we make when we lose to a good team are not helpful because we are supposed to be good too and we should be sorting out what set of players and style gets us some upsets.
We really need to win the group, to avoid Brazil in the quarterfinal. We’d probably get Colombia, which is no bargain either.
If we don’t beat Panama and Bolivia, US Soccer HAS to let Gregg go. The only non-CONCACAF team he has beaten in a competition that matters is Iran. After losing to T&T, no more excuses.
looking at it in schedule order, they should beat bolivia, and panama then becomes the big game. you win the first two you may not need an uruguay result.
my theory on tournaments is it’s more important to be playing well and able to rotate and rest players in group at the end, than trying to manipulate to a positive or from a negative matchup. that line of thinking tends to assume weakness i don’t like being tolerated. i want to believe if i have to play x next round i can win it. you will typically get some help and upsets other side of the bracket. your job is beat the teams you line up with. i think this mentality excuses the team being mediocre. i think they need to win the big ones and make whatever tactical or personnel changes that takes.
Do you think there’s anyway we lose to TnT if Dest doesn’t lose his mind?
We shouldn’t lose if it’s 11 vs. 11 but Gregg ‘s adjustments were abysmal. NO reason whatsoever to have two forwards on the field after the red. One could argue we should have been up by more than 1 before the red.
i think worst case scenario we tie TnT. we had it 1-0. we should win. we were better but the game was also much more out of control than the home contest. worst case they were getting some chances, ding us for an equalizer, 1-1, away tie, we advance. but if we’re trying to up GB at dest’s expense, having seen out plenty of 10 man wins or ties, i thought it was mismanaged and don’t buy the premise. there was more than one domino that had to fall. many other coaches would have shifted that to 441 and sat on the game lead and aggregate margin. i think he wasn’t attuned to TnT being more feisty that night and he acted like it was an easy game he could get cute in. he got punished just like arena did. arena too could blame villafana and omar.
Johnny,
Possibly, but unlikely. We struggled mightily, until the 80th minute, against them at HOME with 11 vs 10, for the bulk of that time.
I just don’t see coach berhaulter feeling any pressure with this job. No real motivation. Everything is honky dory! “It’s a tough group”. No, it’s not coach Gregg, and if you’re not capable of navigating these three games, not much more needs to be said, and he even has at least a couple more competitive games before this event.
It might be nit picking, but we as a nation are competing against other nations. The teams we compete against are our opposition, our opponents. You can shake your competitions hand after the game, after you have won, before that moment, that other team is opposition. The coach misses this fine point.
“Now it’s about planning our game plans, and getting ready to compete”. This is a damning statement to me. It says we don’t have an identifiable way of playing, which forces opposition to play to our game, not the other way around. Our men’s national team, should always be ready to compete, FFS!
where the US has gone awry is we are doing things for aesthetic or aspirational reasons and not because they have been designed to beat france or argentina or the like. i agree with you we need a primary style of play that is consistently used. with perhaps some tactical plans B and C when it doesn’t work. the primary choice should be designed to beat — and actually can beat — that level opponent, at least sometimes.
i do not believe GB is sitting on that Big Idea. i think we have 4-5 years of results where we consistently cannot punch over our weight. to most countries that would long ago have been a clear message their tactics are not the money tree. i see part of the problem as when he does tinker it is in the manner of the one-off, like you’re saying, a game plan for one game. as such 4231 could look like what this thing was meant to play and next game it’ll be something else.
ha, you sound exactly like me here IV, and I agree with a lot.
“where the US has gone awry is we are doing things for aesthetic or aspirational reasons and not because they have been designed to beat france or argentina or the like. i agree with you we need a primary style of play that is consistently used. with perhaps some tactical plans B and C when it doesn’t work. the primary choice should be designed to beat — and actually can beat — that level opponent, at least sometimes.” –IV
on what is needed, imho, is a Team Strategy that, as beaten like a dead horse here, recognizes and incorporates the reality that Winning Tactics in CONCACAF can be/usually are different/very different than vs. France, or Argentina, or plenty other euro and SA teams…for so many reasons.
not necessarily, but observably for decades
this lack of understanding but one fundamental flaws of Klinsman
“Now it’s about planning our game plans, and getting ready to compete”. This is a damning statement to me.” – how better can you say I’m going to disagree with whatever Berhalter says. There is not a team in the world that doesn’t game plan for their opponent in a competition. No matter how well oiled your system is you still are adjusting things specific to each opponent. You don’t have everything the same against a 4-4-2 high press as you do for a 5-4-1 low block. That would ridiculous. The Netherlands game planned for the US at the WC. They were in their traditional formation but where they funneled the ball to (Tyler Adams) was different from other games. This summer Bj used the usual system plan against Panama and got carved up in the first half then deviated from the game plan in the 2nd and forced penalties. It would pretty naive to think “oh the original plan will work if we just have our A team.” Plenty of things to be upset about but preparing for opponents doesn’t seem like a rational thing to complain about.
rubbish. most good NT have their formation and style they seek to impose. you adjust to me and not the other way around. they might shift a specific player into an attacking hole, or onto a marking job of a key opponent, or try to exploit or hide something specific. they might slightly slide people around. they are not letting the opponent dictate their tactics. they are not trying a new formation every other game. if 4231 works that’s what they play until someone is stopping them. i get you’re like, but maybe the opposing formation that day. the likely actual talk is “do the usual thing, but if it’s not working because of where their mid sits, adjust to x.” a different formation, or a different positioning.
this is where the US fails. their coach fancies himself a chessmaster despite his meh results. he does as you suggest, watches his opponents, comes up with his game plan. often enough, doesn’t work. mike tyson, everyone has a game plan til they get punched in the mouth. this coach sticks with his game plan after he is punched in the mouth because he is an evangelist for his ideas, which can’t be wrong, or he just thinks he’s that smart. anyone who played at a decent level any length of time knows sometimes x isn’t “on” today. this guy cannot adjust. he may tinker some pregame but that’s hit and miss. when the pregame tinker is a miss he cannot coach himself out of that hole.
it’s not just scouting and theorizing. it’s being able to adjust on the fly. it’s anticipating your ideas might not work and instructing plans B and C. it’s being able to move around xs and os in real time.
most good teams i’ve been with, you only literally run out something different, usually negative, if you honestly self-assess as we are out of our league and this is our only chance. today we park the bus. this is actually precisely what the US doesn’t do. i wish their response to holland was maybe today we sit back and counter. he instead was going to go end to end with them playing his system.
IV: “ they might shift a specific player into an attacking hole, or onto a marking job of a key opponent, or try to exploit or hide something specific. they might slightly slide people around.” that’s what Gregg is talking about! When has he ever brought out some drastic change? 2019 GC I guess because he scrapped the hybrid RB because it was literally designed around Adams who has muscle injury issues. I sincerely hope he changes out of his 4-3-3 into a 4-2-3-1. We played 15 terrible minutes against Germany probably 15 minutes of pretty good and 60 of ok, and you were screaming burn it all to the ground it’s not good enough. Now Berhalter says they’re going to plan for the opponents and your peeing in his coffee how ridiculous it is to change anything.
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“most good teams i’ve been with, you only literally run out something different, usually negative, if you honestly self-assess as we are out of our league and this is our only chance. today we park the bus.” Did you ever play for the national team IV? Sorry that parking the bus against a D1 college team is a little different than lining up and letting Messi, Alvarez, Demario, Fernandez, etc… take shots at your goal. Don’t talk to us about I played against the Herman Trophy winner, that’s great I’m glad you had that career, but he’s not Messi it’s not the same at all. The talent disparity between the American college players you played against and elite National teams is monumental. The pace and accuracy of shots, the ability to dribble and pass in tight spaces, the reactions of GKs to passes trying to release forwards on the counter it’s just not close to the same. It is literally saying this worked in my U12s so it will work U17s. I’m not criticizing your playing ability or your accomplishments I’m saying it’s just not the same.
Excited to see how the boys do in the tournament.
First thing first the boys have another Nations league to win.
That’s about as friendly a draw as there is in the tournament. Bolivia are terrible – they’re ranked 81st in the world right now. Panama’s 41st…and if they pose any problems to our A squad, Gregg’s got some serious ‘splaining to do.
I think everybody’s well aware Uruguay’s always rough…and they’re playing some good ball right now – they just beat Argentina (in Argentina!) and beat Brazil the window before that, if memory serves. They deservedly jumped over us in the last rankings, since we were busy losing to Trinidad & Tobago while Uruguay were beating the #1 team in the world in their own house. Still, we should get out of our group at the very least.