NEW YORK — “Consider.”
That phrase has over the previous few years grow to be carefully related to America’s most well-known soccer coach, the fictional Ted Lasso of the Apple TV sequence of the identical identify. The identical mantra is now the message coming from essentially the most celebrated and achieved coach in U.S. males’s nationwide crew historical past.
[RELATED:How Mauricio Pochettino will immediately impact the USMNT]
Mauricio Pochettino was formally unveiled because the USMNT’s new boss at a grand press convention in midtown Manhattan on Friday, and when the previous Chelsea, Paris Saint-Germain and Tottenham Hotspur supervisor was requested what he desires to perform with the People because the nation prepares to co-host the largest sporting occasion the world has ever seen 21 months from now, Pochettino did not try and handle what even essentially the most optimistic U.S. followers may see as an entirely unrealistic expectations.
“We now have time, and we have to actually consider in issues, in large issues,” the 52-year-old Argentine mentioned. “We have to consider that we are able to win all of the video games, that we are able to win the World Cup.”
There’s clearly an enormous distinction between considering you’ll be able to win the sport’s most coveted trophy and truly doing it — one thing Pochettino little doubt understands in addition to anybody. However he additionally is aware of that to have any form of success in 2026, his first order of enterprise must be restoring the USMNT’s badly shaken confidence.
After changing into the primary Copa América host to be knocked out in group play earlier this summer season, the squad’s self-assurance is at its lowest level because the program’s epic failure to qualify for the 2018 World Cup. So Pochettino’s speedy objective have to be to get his gamers to as soon as once more play with out concern, to consider that they’ll stand toe-to-toe with any opponent — irrespective of which one.
“In fact the arrogance was just a little bit low after the Copa América,” Pochettino mentioned. “I believe it is an excellent era of gamers. We have to present that we play like a collective on the pitch.”
That work will start in earnest subsequent month. Pochettino’s first match answerable for the U.S. will come on Oct. 12 in Austin, Texas, the place the People will meet Concacaf rival Panama in a so-called pleasant.Â
“For me,” Pochettino mentioned, “it is not pleasant.”
Attending to not simply know the gamers however to see them in camp, on the coaching area, within the meal room on the resort, will let him and his three-man employees of longtime assistants Jesus Perez, Miguel D’Agostino and Toni Jimenez know precisely the place issues stand. “We now have a plan, and a very powerful factor is to really feel how they’re on the sector collectively,” Pochettino mentioned. “[The players] can categorical themselves, how they see the crew.”
Pochettino mentioned the thought is to ultimately base himself within the U.S. full-time. However house-hunting within the Atlanta space — the place U.S. Soccer is setting up a state-of-the-art coaching facility — will not start instantly. He’ll stay in his adopted hometown of Barcelona for now, enabling him to maintain shut tabs on the USMNT’s largely European-based participant pool. Constructing these relationships will probably be essential.
“They should really feel our help clearly, to really feel that we look after them,” he mentioned. “When the gamers really feel that you just care, you get the most effective [out of that] participant.”
Because the crew’s dismal Copa efficiency confirmed, there may be quite a lot of work to do. “Enchancment for us is basically vital,” he mentioned. “We need to play good soccer, good soccer, thrilling soccer, attacking soccer.”
“They should know precisely what we have to do, how we have to compete, how we have to behave like a crew,” Pochettino added. “And the potential is there, the expertise is there.”
It is a part of what attracted certainly one of Planet Fútbol’s most coveted membership coaches to his first worldwide job. It wasn’t the one factor, although. Pochettino has lengthy been intrigued by the U.S. as a rustic as a lot as a soccer nation.
“It is a successful tradition, a successful mentality,” he mentioned. With a house World Cup on the horizon, the chance was too good to cross up. For the U.S. Soccer Federation, the hiring is nothing in need of a coup.Â
“His soccer résumé speaks for itself,” mentioned U.S. president Cindy Parlow Cone. “Past that, additionally his ardour — and you’ve got heard it from him at the moment — and his perception that we are able to go and do nice issues and that he may also help us get there. Put all that collectively, and we consider that we now have the most effective individual on the earth for this job.”Â
“It is about creating one thing particular — that is a very powerful factor,” Pochettino mentioned. Â
In opposition to the really elite soccer nations — simply eight have ever hoisted the World Cup — that will not be simple. It is going to be subsequent to not possible towards any opponent if the mentality is not exhausting as nails.Â
“We’re going to compete,” promised Pochettino, who arrives with a popularity for getting essentially the most out of his gamers and likewise growing expertise from inside.
That is the start line, after all. The place the U.S. goes from there may be as much as them. There are not any limitations so far as Pochettino is worried. “When you mentioned to me that I want to choose just one phrase,” he mentioned when requested what satisfied him and his employees to depart European membership soccer behind and take the leap the U.S. job represents. “As a result of we consider. We consider we are able to work collectively to attempt to obtain what folks, and us, all need: to win, and never solely win video games however to go for giant trophies and to be there, competing, for the World Cup.”
“We’re right here,” he mentioned, “as a result of we need to win.”
Doug McIntyre is a soccer reporter for FOX Sports activities. A former employees author with ESPN and Yahoo Sports activities, he has coated U.S. males’s and ladies’s nationwide groups at FIFA World Cups on 5 continents. Comply with him @ByDougMcIntyre.
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