Several European managers have been linked with the U.S. men’s national team head coaching vacancy and another has reportedly joined the mix.
Mauricio Pochettino is linked with the current USMNT head coach job, Ole reported Wednesday. Pochettino is also being considered as an option for the England national team’s managerial opening following Gareth Southgate’s departure this summer.
The 52-year-old left English Premier League side Chelsea by mutual consent last May. Pochettino had some tough moments at Stamford Bridge, but did help the Blues qualify for Europe thanks to a strong end-of-season run.
A long-time international player, Pochettino is well known for his time as Tottenham manager from May 2014-November 2019. He led Spurs to a UEFA Champions League Final before eventually moving to Paris Saint-Germain in 2021.
All three of his trophies won as a manager came at PSG before joining Chelsea ahead of the 2023-24 Premier League campaign. Pochettino has also served as manager of Spanish club Espanyol and English side Southampton.
The USMNT have been linked with several coaches this summer including LAFC’s Steve Cherundolo and Columbus Crew’s Wilfried Nancy. Jurgen Klopp, Herve Renard, and Patrick Vieira have also been linked with the opening, although it seems unlikely any will make the move to the U.S. due to salary demands.
U.S. Soccer parted ways with Gregg Berhalter earlier this month after the USMNT exited the 2024 Copa America tournament in the group stage.
Patrick Viera and Strasbourg mutually part ways. He and the Chelsea ownership group reportedly had different expectations for Strasbourg, but it does clear availability for the USMNT.
Taylor Twellman has been screaming his name for so long now…. I really don’t think he’s “The perfect fit” for the US men’s National Team
vieira has never “won” anything as a coach and had more Ls than Ws his last 2 jobs (palace and strasbourg). at NYC the team improved and won its conference AFTER they swapped him our for torrent. he has less resume oomph behind him than even GB did — who at least made a final — which to me is tepid relative to what we used to hire.
i might condone the taskmastery if he won — but he doesn’t.
we want a good coach either ran out their deal or can be bought out. we do not want to be picking around the european trash can of fired coaches — or at least not for people fired from lousy teams for lousy records.
the idea on europe is hire someone whose nous, experience, and results are beyond anything we have here. coached germany or dortmund or city or something. if it’s vieira based on MLS resume and meh results he wouldn’t even be the best “domestic” option. he wouldn’t be getting hired for having liverpool in the UCL final or winning EPL. he’d be hired for being “from europe” but “coached in MLS.” if he then finished behind someone else — hire someone else.
hahaha, some of the comments / responses on here are vicious……
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Whether its a Mauricio Pochettino or Rafael Benítez or Luis de la Fuente or whoever…….the coach taking over needs to have the qualifications to coach at a high /elite level, is known for developing young talent, has shown he can get the best results with “average” players and will not be influenced by any external BS biases remotely related to US soccer.
We need a coach WHO CAN GENUINELY SPOT TALENT, maximize the entire US player pool (home base and abroad) based on current form and will select the right / best players FOR HIS TEAM, without caring about where you play or who you play for or who your parents are or what youth system you were in.
Our next coach should be selected with a long term goal in mind. The US is a young soccer nation that needs proper and elite level structure, coaching and mentoring to be able to compete with the elite teams of the world. Time is of the essence, so delivering in 2 years and working well under pressure is a must.
Like most top coaches around the world he should have the ability to spot our potential top talent, and develop these talented players towards becoming world class. As a Coach of the United States he should be respected enough to open doors for USMNT players based on HIS SELECTION AND EVALUATION alone……and have high level dual nationals wanting to play for him and join the program (that’s why Jurgen Klopp is amazing).
Selecting a coach for the USMNT and taking our program to the next level is not going to be easy…….and the qualifications needed to make this program close to “ELITE” is way outside the abilities, capabilities and experience of coaches like Gregg Berhalter, Steve Cherundolo, Wilfried Nancy (amazing up and coming coach!!!!), Bob Bradley, Bruce Arena .etc
“Information is not knowledge. The only source of knowledge is experience. You need experience to gain wisdom.” Albert Einstein
Oh is that all! I’m not sure that person exists anywhere in the world, but I love the enthusiasm.
Pep Guardiola, Jurgen Klopp, Xabi Alonso, Mauricio Pochettino, Luis de la Fuente….to a lesser extent Ruben Amorim, Thiago Motta, Leonardo Jardim (just to name a few) lol
Poch or Low or whoever I am just ready to get my popcorn ready. These next two years will be an interesting time. I expect there will be players on that final WC roster that people didn’t think would be there. Two years is a long time. Have feeling some players will rise and others may fall.
Holy Kreis! Another non-American. The Italians still make monkey sounds in the stands of their matches. We don’t need a coach from a country known to promote skin color idealism. (This includes Uruguay & Argentina, there’s docs about this). He definitely prefers the same players GB likes and will keep non-athletic types on the field. We did not get out of the group stage because of this specific factor. No MLS players played for the U.S. & we didn’t make it out of the group on home soil. How are we even STILL remotely euro-centric? The number 1 reason CONCACAF is difficult IS the athleticism. (2- Humidity, 3- travel, 4- Refs, 5- field conditions). Africa is the only other region where travel is expansive. North America shows up in the sprints. Canada, Jamaica, USA, Bahamas, Grenada, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Panama and others have multiple medals over 4 decades. The Italians have the defending Olympic 100m Gold medalist but he was born & raised in Texas. Italy never won a sprint medal ever; gets an American and wins gold. England & France are the 2 countries from Europe who have consistently showed up on the medal stand the last 4 decades. Currently, in the last 8 years, France has competed in the last 2 WC finals & England has won the majority of the international youth competitions, except the Olympics. There is an athletic component to this sport. There’s no coach from another country that’s going to come in under 2 years time and understand this. Not hiring an American for a WC played in America would be disrespectful as a spit in the face of all Americans.
Usain Bolt wanted to be a soccer player and he was the fastest runner in history. Maybe we can persuade him to get US citizenship and then we can be a world power.
Classic and hilarious response to a rather unknowledgeable / ignorant post …and love it! My stomach hurts from laughing so hard!
“The Italians still make monkey sounds in the stands of their matches. We don’t need a coach from a country known to promote skin color idealism.”
You are stupid.
Have you heard of donald trump?
Hell, have you heard of republican politicians?
“Not hiring an American for a WC played in America would be disrespectful as a spit in the face of all Americans.”
Speak for yourself.
In case you’ve forgotten, Gregg is an American and in a Copa America played in America, he has shit all over my team in front of America and the world. The passport part I don’t care about. The shit all over part, the world wide laughing stock that the USMNT now is? That is of some concern to me.
You didn’t actually research Marcel Jacob’s story did you?
You do realize that Poch is an Argie, not an Italian?
Yes?
My concern is not about any coach’s Nationality, or that coach’s nation’s culture’s perceived racism, etc.,….. (Spain has struggled with a lot of Euro-centrism and anti-African racism, in their fans, in their culture, and on their national team set-up. But look at the national team now, and the success of their adopted Moroccan and Ghanaian players, et al. How do you like them apples?) …but rather my concern is, does this coach have experience coaching in World Cups? Poch has a compelling professional Club Coach career, but zero World Cup experience. Coaching a professional club team, and coaching a National Team up to and through a World Cup are two very different animals.
OK, granted – Poch does have the experience of being a part of the Argentinian National Team set up, and playing in a WC with Argentina.
That counts for something.
Yet, de la Fuente would be my choice. If we could have him.
Pero eso es, porque yo soy Español!
Not bad. Good to focus on Argies Coach.
I would expect the US will need to pay 4 to 6 million for coach like Pochettino or any established top five candidate. Southgate was the highest paid coach in the Euros at 5 £. German coach was next at 4.8£.
Do you pay for a name or the right fit?
Cherundolo just doesn’t do much for me. Not much experience and always has a more talented roster
as i understand it, england is also interested in pochettino. if they want their pick they need to be aggressive and make offers. if they want to fart around, act like a bureaucracy, make initial approaches about are they interested, then maybe ask them to do the dance in 3 weeks, while england and others look around many of the same folks, the good ones will be gone.
US Men’s Soccer coach opening is to coaching as MLS is to players of CL teams looking for transfers (there’s a transitive property for you that actually tracks)
in terms of your initial jab, 90+% of the time in college, in my day pre-internet, if your college A beat college B 2-0, and college B beat college C 2-0, and you had college C on your schedule later, you were good for roughly 4-0 yourself. it was a useful rule of thumb on what to expect before video and the internet. you can mock it but it’s true. kind of like colombia put 5 past panama too, or brazil and uruguay tied just like we tied brazil. or kind of like i told people before couva happened that when we beat TnT 2-0 at home the road game would be tough. this is basic common sense anyone who played leagues or tournaments knows in their bones. the games don’t 100% play out to it, but it’s a useful hint what to expect or what your team should do. i think the US underperformed not just relative to vague potential but even relative to what the -berhalter-for-granted H2H suggests we should have done.
your analysis of the job is similarly off. we got klinsi before between stints at germany and bayern/korea, mourinho expressed interest last time. what USSF chooses to do with outside interest does not mean no one cares.
the women hired hayes.
IV
“in terms of your initial jab, 90+% of the time in college, in my day pre-internet, if your college A beat college B 2-0, and college B beat college C 2-0, and you had college C on your schedule later, you were good for roughly 4-0 yourself. it was a useful rule of thumb on what to expect before video and the internet. you can mock it but it’s true.”
It’s true only if you’re talking about teams playing each other in the context of a same season schedule.
And even then, meet that same team later in the season and you may not recognize them at all. Maybe not in college but pros change managers all the time or get new players ( back from injury or via trade).
You insist on applying college parameters to professional set ups ( either club or national team) and that can lead to bogus conclusions.
Once you step outside the boundary of that schedule your “transitive properties” begin to lose value. For example, comparing a Copa America tie or die match with Uruguay with a friendly with them two years ago is pointless.
Uruguay now has a different manager and likely many different players.
And the players who remain the same, well, they are two years better or two years worse. No one stays the same.
Comparing Copa America Uruguay with pre-Qatar friendly Uruguay is foolish.
You have often often compared results gotten by Dave Sarachan in friendly matches played almost five years ago with players like Juan Agudelo, Dom Dwyer and CJ Sapong to results Gregg got in friendlies or competitive games.
You’re wasting everyone’s time with that malarkey.
dude, my sarachan comments are not hard to understand. i am not pro-sarachan. but i think he underlined how bad GB sucked. as early as 17/18 sarachan had several guys GB dropped down to U23 on the senior team. you can name the washouts but the point is he had faith in weah, miles, richards, etc. — a big chunk of the current lineup — when GB thought they were age group stuff.
and in 17/18 managed to tie france and portugal. you can mock the guys he did it with but you miss my point. a roll out the ball coach with a slightly better personnel eye could get as good of results out of the same pool as GB did. GB was zero value added.
i am not singing the praises of sarachan. i am showing how far off this coach was on who he picked — or do you forget 19/20??? and then when a lot of these players were like teenagers sarachan could get ties off some european teams, and we LITERALLY HAVE NOT PUSHED PAST THAT IN 6 YEARS. basic common sense should be that as this good generation moved up the WINS would follow. if sarachan could get some ties, where are GB’s wins?
really not hard to follow at all. my way of saying, essentially, GB is worse than sarachan.
if you disagree go look up sarachan’s colombia margin from 18. his team didn’t ship 5 goals.
i think a trained monkey could coach this team better than what we’ve had for nearly a decade.
dude, suggesting that a result 2 years ago supplies no information is a lie. i agree that one or the other team may evolve. sometimes. but not always.
you then seem to miss that even in your change scenario, if everyone else is progressing and you are not — that itself is telling. your college A ties college B when you are freshmen. you play college B the next season and they win 4-0.
what does that tell you about your program? your coach got outrecruited, your coach can’t retain players on the team, your coach can’t coach. SOMETHING.
it’s nihilistic bs to be like 2 years ago is gone. if 2 years ago we beat panama and put up 5 goals and now they beat us, a team that actually wants to fix it as opposed to throw stomp fits that they don’t just show up and get handed wins, WOULD ASK WHY. the easiest step is toss the coach overboard. the harder steps are actually do a post mortem, and some scouting, and reconsider what we’ve been doing — the actual changes.
my dynamo for about 3 coaches straight would fire the last guy, then bring in a new one and seemingly give them marching orders that they would have the same players and were there to pursue a similar coaching concept. and the results didn’t change until olsen was brought in and deferred to on tactics.
the important question is always “why.” you don’t know what you’re doing if you don’t get “why” it works or not.
Typical IV never letting facts get in the way of a good rant. Neither Richards or Robinson played under Sarachan.
IV
“dude, my sarachan comments are not hard to understand.”
Your sarachan comments are a good example of jumping to conclusions based on little or even no evidence.
“i am not pro-sarachan. but i think he underlined how bad GB sucked.”
Gregg did not need help in displaying his ineptitude, but Dave did no such thing.
“as early as 17/18 sarachan had several guys GB dropped down to U23 on the senior team. you can name the washouts but the point is he had faith in weah, miles, richards, etc. — a big chunk of the current lineup — when GB thought they were age group stuff.”
Faith in Weah………….?? Bullshit. Dave was playing with house money. He was ticking off names from list and, giving them a basic set up and then telling them to have fun. He had none of the pressure for results that Gregg had. There is zero comparison. Comparing the job Dave did with what Gregg did is a bad idea because, apples to oranges, they were doing two different jobs.
As you may know, the entire US soccer community was in shock over Couva so there was no point is fielding any of our failed veterans. As Dave said: “It was like, ‘Dave, here are the keys. Do it the way you think makes sense.’ And my thinking at that time was obviously, we have to introduce a lot of younger guys, no doubt. Because we have to take the broader view of four years down the line. Also, knowing in my experience with successful teams at all different levels, the importance of blending in some veterans. But obviously on the scale, it would be the younger guy,” Sarachan said. In his one year in charge, twenty three players made their senior national team debut. Nine of them, Tyler Adams, Weston McKennie, Antonee Robinson, Timothy Weah, Josh Sargent, Aaron Long, Cameron Carter-Vickers, Shaq Moore and Luca de la Torre — would go to Qatar.
That stat reflects the reality of a player pool that had a huge gap between the promising youth national teams and the old guys.
Dave’s priority was expanding the pool and letting players develop.
But when his time suddenly got a lot longer he had to think about results as well. Basically, the USMNT did not need any more negativity from bad losses.
Dave initially was only supposed to interim ONE game but for any number of reasons he wound up doing 12
Portugal 1–1
Bosnia and Herzegovina 0–0
Paraguay 1–0
Bolivia 3–0
Republic of Ireland 1–2
France 1–1
Brazil 0–2
Mexico 1–0
Colombia 2–4
Peru 1–1
England 0–3
Italy 0-1
12 games
That is a nice list of opponents presumably lined up before Couva as prep for Russia 2018. If not then probably a lot of these teams were looking from WC prep practice.
When results unexpectedly became an issue it was not because of competitive pressure, but because the program did not need more negativity from bad losses. And the U.S.’s opponents during the Sarachan era were far from pushovers.
They played Portugal in Portugal, France in France, Brazil, Colombia, England at Wembley and finally Italy.
“As we got into the March window and started looking ahead a little bit, and when I knew that I was going to continue on, at least through June, part of me said, ‘Well look, whenever we do anything we want to win.’ Winning is still important… It was still a combination of vetting young guys, but results were important so that we’d begin to bring back some faith in the men’s program and the new direction we were going,” Sarachan said.
Sarachan considered a 1-1 draw against France in June “a pivotal point” in that mission. The Americans defended resolutely to surprisingly spoil the hosts’ World Cup sendoff in Lyon. After the match, Sarachan was so impressed with the opponents that he told French manager Didier Deschamps that France would win the World Cup. About five weeks later Les Bleus indeed lifted the trophy in Russia.
“It wasn’t a World Cup game. It wasn’t a qualifier. So the pressure of those types of games was off. This was, ‘we’re playing with house money’ kind of game. No one expected us to get a result, I’m sure. And our guys went into that game with no fear,” Sarachan said. “At about 75th minute, I remember in my own head thinking, ‘I think we’ve turned the corner in terms of respect, in terms of getting interest back, we’re competing against this team.’”
“For historical reasons, playing in Wembley was quite an experience. But what stuck out to me in that game was they didn’t field their ‘A’ team on that day. And I was just pretty amazed at the size and speed… these guys were really fit and good and deep. And it really hit me, ‘We still have a ways to go.’”
On that night in November, 2018, England cruised to a 3-0 victory. “They came out very quickly, and we were on our back foot a little bit. But again, we had an extremely young team that hadn’t really played together at that time, so I’m sure we’re going to be a lot more prepared this time,” veteran defender DeAndre Yedlin said.
“and in 17/18 managed to tie france and portugal. you can mock the guys he did it with but you miss my point. a roll out the ball coach with a slightly better personnel eye could get as good of results out of the same pool as GB did. GB was zero value added.”
IV, do you sell used cars for a living?
You keep trying to sell us your line of malarkey long after the facts make a huge dent in the credibility of your presentation.
You keep insisting that those apples of yours are the same thing as the oranges you are trying to compare them to. That’s why you keep setting off malarkey alarms.
Dave happens to be a very good manager who is very experienced. He did a great job, off the cuff and on the fly, but it wasn’t anything like what Gregg had to do.
Dave himself pointed out that he dealt mostly with kids who were just having fun and playing free and easy. And the opponents did not bring their A teams and certainly were not taking the friendlies that seriously. By the time those same kids had gotten to Gregg things were very different and not just because of Gregg.
“i am not singing the praises of sarachan.”
You should. He’s a very good manager and did a fine job for those clown cars in the USSF.
“i am showing how far off this coach was on who he picked — or do you forget 19/20??? and then when a lot of these players were like teenagers sarachan could get ties off some european teams, and we LITERALLY HAVE NOT PUSHED PAST THAT IN 6 YEARS. basic common sense should be that as this good generation moved up the WINS would follow. if sarachan could get some ties, where are GB’s wins?”
In 12 games Dave had
3 wins
4 draws
5 losses
Not great results but Dave was not, at least initially, asked to get results.
Once they expect results, everything changes.
Why are you bothering with this narrative? Tell us something that not everybody on SBI and all their family members, their pets and everyone else in the neighborhood do not already know.
“really not hard to follow at all. my way of saying, essentially, GB is worse than sarachan.”
Maybe but was anyone, anywhere arguing that point? Why?
Gregg’s USMNT manager narrative is now complete and it is all there for anyone to judge.
Dave’s USMNT manager narrative will remain incomplete, unless they hire him this time around, because he never served as a full time manager and never had anything other than caretaker interim duties.
“if you disagree go look up sarachan’s colombia margin from 18. his team didn’t ship 5 goals.”
It was a friendly. And Gregg didn’t have that team available for 2024.
Which proves what exactly? Here’s your USMNT lineup for that game.
Lineups:
USA: 12-Zack Steffen; 2-DeAndre Yedlin, 3-Matt Miazga, 6-John Brooks, 17-Antonee Robinson (19-Ben Sweat, 75); 4-Michael Bradley (capt.), 23-Kellyn Acosta; 11-Tim Weah (8-Marky Delgado, 68), 16-Julian Green (13-Josh Sargent, 80), 10-Kenny Saief (14-Fafa Picault, 58); 7-Bobby Wood (9-Andrija Novakovich, 80)
Substitutes not used: 1-Brad Guzan, 5-Cameron Carter-Vickers, 18-Reggie Cannon, 20-Wil Trapp
Head coach: Dave Sarachan
How does that relate to Copa 2024 when the manager is different and only Jedi, Weah and Josh of those who played, were also in Copa America 2024? Explain.
Copa America 2024 Colombia is an exceptional team with a better manager than their 2018 friendly version. The 2024 Colombia might have scored 8 on Dave’s guys.
“i think a trained monkey could coach this team better than what we’ve had for nearly a decade.”
Not impossible but unlikely. Even the best trained monkeys would have a difficult time obtaining the necessary coaching badges required to coach a national team. Communicating with the players would also be an issue. On the plus side, their salary demands might be within the USSF’s budget.