Throughout his first cycle as manager of the U.S. men’s national team, Gregg Berhalter opened camps by showing a timeline of what the team had in front of them to get to the World Cup.
With each camp, the timeline got shorter and shorter. It hammered home the idea of how close the team was to its ultimate goal, the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, but it was also a reminder of what the team had already accomplished together.
That timeline has started over now. After an eight-month delay, during which U.S. Soccer investigated Berhalter and the U.S. men played under two interim managers, the team is moving forward under Berhalter, who was re-hired as manager in June. The new three-year timeline has fewer roadblocks — as co-hosts of the 2026 World Cup the destination is already secured — but the expectations around this team going into that tournament have them racing toward a new finish line.
“For us, it’s continuing to build on the foundation of what we’ve had in the last four years,” Berhalter said on Friday. “Keep improving, and really target 2026 as an opportunity to change soccer in America forever.”
The foundation was, for the most part, on the field on Saturday against Uzbekistan in Berhalter’s first game back on the sideline. The starting lineup included eight starters from last November’s World Cup. The U.S. played in a familiar 4-3-3 formation, but there were also signs of how this group is changing.
Folarin Balogun, who recently committed to the program, started up top. Chris Richards, who was out injured ahead of Qatar, started in the backline. Ricardo Pepi, one of the final cuts from the 2022 World Cup team, scored to give the U.S. the cushion it needed to see out the game. The U.S. needed just four minutes to score its first goal and, despite a sleepy pace to the game, pulled away from a 3-0 win.
Tim strikes first 🚀 pic.twitter.com/MvjseHs2GV
— U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team (@USMNT) September 9, 2023
It was an imperfect performance, for sure, and one that emphasized how this U.S. team still has plenty of room to grow. Players said after the game that they were working out new ways to build out. Defender Tim Ream described it as players using different movements and changing positions to alter the team’s shape and trying to pull the opponent out of position.
“It’s a learning process for sure, but one that we’re working on every day,” Ream said, “and going to try to perfect and get it to where we want it to be.”
The game on Saturday was a chance to tinker. It was also a sign that the process of evolving is already underway.
“I think we use this game as a learning tool,” Berhalter said postgame.
The team’s overall dissatisfaction with the performance, however, is also a sign of the increasing expectations around this group. The aim Berhalter laid out at the start of camp was to advance in the World Cup to a round the U.S. men have never played in before — at least in the modern history of the game. That means surpassing the quarterfinal appearance in 2002 and playing in a semifinal or World Cup final. It’s a lofty objective, but one befitting of a group many have labeled a “golden generation” for this national team. If they are to live up to that moniker, they have to set new standards.
The team that went to Qatar was the second-youngest in the tournament. That won’t be the case in three years. The key leaders of this team must mature into star players. During training last week, Berhalter said the team broke into three teams of seven — old, medium and young. Christian Pulisic, 24, and Weston McKennie, 25, were on the old team. There is still plenty of youth in the group, but a core of players — led by Pulisic, McKennie, Tim Weah, 23, and Tyler Adams, 24 — will be in its prime when the World Cup kicks off in 2026.
Their individual growth, along with that of the team, is paramount.
“For us, it’s really the work we can do the next three years to build a group that when we go to the World Cup, we’re confident that we can beat the elite of international soccer because that’s what it’s going to take to do what we’re talking about doing,” Berhalter said. “If we want to go to rounds that we’ve never been to before, we have to beat those teams. And we’ll use the next three years to build the team up, to gain experiences (so) that we’re confident that we can actually do that.”
(Photo by John Dorton/Getty Images for USSF)
The efforts to improve will come on several different levels within the program. First, Berhalter must find a way to build a working relationship with Gio Reyna. That is a complicated task after the events of the last year, which included Reyna nearly being sent home from Qatar, Berhalter’s comments about those events at a leadership conference being published, and Reyna’s parents, Claudio and Danielle, eventually reporting a three-decade-old incident involving Berhalter and his then-girlfriend, now wife, Rosalind, to U.S. Soccer leadership. Berhalter has not yet spoken to Gio Reyna, and the Dortmund attacker is not in this camp as he regains fitness following a leg injury he suffered in the CONCACAF Nations League final, but that task will be a vital one in maximizing a talented young prospect.
As far as the team is concerned, Berhalter said he met with sporting director Matt Crocker over three days to evaluate every part of the program to see what worked well and what didn’t and to make changes accordingly. They put every aspect of the program into “buckets,” Berhalter said and evaluated how they could be successful in those areas. He also evaluated every phase of the game with the team to search for improvements, from set pieces to mid-block defending to efficiency in the final third.
“It’s literally everything,” Berhalter said. “Every aspect. … We want to be in the state of evolving because we know it’s going to lead to improvement.”
Saturday night’s result showed some hints at that evolution. When it worked, the subs who came on late in the second half played with the right level of aggression and broke Uzbekistan down, it was effective. When it didn’t, the game felt too slow. But evolution isn’t about a singular performance, and Saturday was only the very first step in the process.
Change is coming. The last cycle taught us as much when losses to Mexico early in Berhalter’s tenure helped shape the identity of a team that now hasn’t lost to Mexico in its last six games. This U.S. team must show consistency and that it can be aggressive and assertive in the right moments.
“We like what’s been built, but we want to keep getting better,” Berhalter said. “Then it was, ‘OK, we have three years to keep improving. What phases do we need to improve and what wrinkles do we need to put in that are going to help us get there? How do we need to sort of support the players in a way that they can keep improving with their clubs?’ But overall, for us, it’s just how do we keep moving forward and not being happy with where we were.”
(John Dorton/ISI Photos/USSF/Getty Images for USSF)
