Brenden Aaronson is in the U.S. men’s national team squad for the first time in 2025 and after playing a large part of Leeds United’s Premier League promotion, will now try and translate that energy to the international level.
Aaronson is one of several veteran players called in for the USMNT’s upcoming five matches this June. Mauricio Pochettino named Aaronson to his 27-player roster on Thursday, hoping that Aaronson can help fill the void left by Christian Pulisic, who was given a break from international duty this summer.
For Aaronson, it marks his first senior call-up since last November, and one that could play a huge springboard into his long-term role for 2026. The 24-year-old featured in all 46 of Leeds United’s EFL Championship matches last season, scoring nine goals and adding two assists.
While his goal contributions were up-and-down throughout the campaign, one trait that stayed consistent was Aaronson’s defensive pressing and work rate in Daniel Farke’s squad. Both are similar attributes that Aaronson has delivered with the USMNT in his 47 caps to date, and key in how Pochettino wants his squad to play leading up to the CONCACAF Gold Cup and FIFA World Cup.
Pochettino hasn’t had tons of opportunities to work with Aaronson yet, but expects him to lead by example for the USMNT this summer.
“For Brenden, we already know his quality,” Pochettino said during Thursday’s press conference with reporters. “The most important thing is that he keeps bringing his energy, positivity, enthusiasm, and passion. He is the type of player that transmits energy to the rest of the team.
“These feelings are really important,” the Argentine manager added. “He is a player that already has experience, he was really good last season for Leeds as they won the Championship. He is an important player that can help build our spirit and he needs to understand that he cannot stop being the way that he is.”
The USMNT will ultimately hope that Aaronson can be impactful in the final third, especially if they want to make a deep run at the Gold Cup.
look, some teams are premised on defense and work rate first. but it can also just be the lame motivational effort of a coach who can’t come up with working tactics (or at least tactics that function without one particular name present, which doesn’t really sound like tactics much). yeah, let’s go play hard.
personally i believe in a division of labor and see it as a bad sign when you’re preaching to attacker subs about work rate. normally if i want to sell work rate it’s the 6 or some shut down backs. and if you’re praising attackers — even ones who put in the work on defense — it’s for their ability to chill back down when we get the ball, and create.
i should elaborate that slightly. “let’s go play hard. that’ll be $6 million in my swiss bank account.”
It took me a minute to see what Poch was doing, but the more I look at it, the more I think he actually does understand the US talent pool a lot better than anyone realizes. And this is also why he makes the big bucks.
Pochettino’s not building an American Europe-League All Star Team. He’s building a squad for a hot, scorching tournament to be played in the middle of the American summer. And he knows two things – MLS guys will be in mid-season form, and European league guys are likely going to be exhausted from long season. And he’s planning for an 8-game tournament.
He also understands something equally critical about the US squad – we don’t have much in the way of true wingers, and our FB pool is far heavier on wingbacks than true fullbacks. Which is why – no Scally, and nobody who might remotely be considered a winger.
I was originally thinking Poch was showing us a 4-4-2 for the Gold Cup but I don’t think he is. He’s been pretty consistent in starting in a 4-2-3-1, but in possession that will likely morph into a 3-5-2, with the wingbacks being DeJuan Jones/Max Arfsten on the left and Sergino Dest/Alex Freeman on the right providing width. Scally is a pure FB and doesn’t fit in this setup so he’s out.
Here’s where we’re going to see the change, IMHO, and this is old classic Tottenham Pochettino. As the wingbacks push up and become attacking players, he’ll drop one of the 6’s into the middle CB role. This will be Adams, Zawadski, or Berhalter. The other 6 will step up into the box-to-box/shuttler role, and here’s where I think he’s looking for a good passer – Cardoso and Luca de La Torre. The LW’s – in this case, Diego Luna and Jack McGlynn – will tuck in and become LM’s, and Malik Tillman and Quinn Sullivan both prefer operating in the right half-space and will be the RW’s that then morph into RM’s. Aaronson is a guy you can plug in anywhere.
Now to the strikers – and this is why no Sargent; who is not just battling an ankle injury but is also best as a lone striker, whereas Pochettino prefers classic 9’s and pure second strikers who like to run off a target forward. Haji can play as either, and fairly well. Downs and White are pure 9’s, and Balogun and Agyemang are going to technically play the “10” in the 4-3-2-1 but don’t be fooled, they’re second strikers who are going to run off the target man.
I think we’re likely going to see a very different performance this time around. Oh, and I absolutely think Poch brought four keepers so if Steffen can’t go, he still has three…but if he can get fit, Steffen’s our starting keeper.
Oh, and a couple more thoughts. Tanner Tessmann, like Scally and Sargent, is out because he doesn’t fit. He’s not a shuttler like Cardoso, Luca, or when he returns, Musah, and he’s not a destroyer like Adams or Zawadski.
When he returns, Pulisic and Luna are our LW/LM’s. I’d bet on McKennie and Tillman for RW/RM. And here’s the wild part – I suspect Weah rotates with Dest at RWB.
Malik generally plays on the left because he likes to cut in and shoot with his right. But the rest of your theory makes sense. Of course we’ve thought rosters were signaling formation changes before and then it didn’t happen.
I’ve been advocating for Weah as Dest replacement at RWB since his red card. Not gonna happen if it hasn’t happened yet. Dest was out for how long?
I like all the things you’ve outlined though.
quozzel,
“And here’s the wild part – I suspect Weah rotates with Dest at RWB.”
If Dest gets back to his best he and Weah are two of our best.
Why not find a way to use both at the same time instead of rotating them?
You have the cart before the horse just a little bit.
You don’t cram players into a style. You fit the style to the players
Pochettino will have to use the two friendlies and the GC to find his big balls core players. I don’t think he’s there yet. Hopefully he’ll find more than 26.
I understand the tendency to look at Spurs but Pochettino has a lot more to him than what he did there. And red, white and blue lenses notwithstanding we don’t have a Kane and a Son.
I’m more intrigued by his Bielsa bloodlines and the possibilities in that direction. I’ve been critical of BA, a mediocre player, but it’s worth remembering that it was BieIsa, according to what I have read, who was originally interested in buying him though Orta may have influenced that.
Messi of Medford may be more important than I thought.
Awesome analogy quozzel. I like you point of view.
When it comes to the players we have left, my only concern is
▪️ Do we fit players to a system or use a system that’s working for the players?
▪️ Do we look at the different formations that they are currently striving / excelling in (so we do not have to reinvent the wheel) and maybe try to incorporate that in our attack strategy?
▪️ Do we concentrate on players doing well in the 4-2-3-1 first but have the player pool to pivot to something else?
4-3-3 : PSV, Vancouver and San Diego FC Koln (Koln sometimes play a 4-1-2-1-2 which a more attack oriented 4-3-3)
4-2-3-1: RSL, Charlotte FC, Coventry City, Leeds United, Bournemouth, Real Betis, FC Koln, Houston Dynamo, Philadelphia Union
4-4-2: Monaco, Charlotte FC
(For defense formations are mostly a 4 player backline, with the exception of sometimes Crystal Palace and the Columbus Crew)
Pochettino selected these players for a reason, so it’s going to be interesting to see what he has plans to do or if, at all, he will switch things around.