COLUMBUS – Mauricio Pochettino understands very well why he is here, talking to the media after coaching the United States to a 2-0 victory over Japan at Lower.com Field. He has this job because something was not quite right with the men’s national team program as the final months of 2024 approached.
It is not customary for a national team coach to prepare for the world’s biggest sporting event in something less than the time between the end of one such tournament and the start of another. Pochettino must do in 20 months what others will stretch over 47. He accepted the assignment – the lucrative assignment, at a salary estimated at $6 million — to fix as much of what was wrong as possible to assure the results at the 2026 FIFA World Cup could be as rewarding as might be imagined. He will not try to convince anyone that a single win, behind a pair of beautiful goals from forwards Alex Zendejas and Folarin Balogun, will dramatically alter his approach.
“That is why I am so relaxed. We stick with the plan and keep going,” Pochettino told The Sporting News. “But I don’t say that it’s not important that we won a game because it’s a friendly. The most important is the process. Today, we didn’t lose. It’s about the process. It’s about the player believing in what we are doing, that they respect us, how we respect them. That we are able to build the relationship.
“Give time to the process, and the process is going to work. For sure.”
Following a 2-0 loss to South Korea in an exhibition last weekend, there were some loud voices among former national team members who now serve as broadcast analysts who expressed their belief, in so many words, that Pochettino should be out of time. “I don’t say big noise, it’s few noise,” he said. “It’s noise that’s difficult to hear.”
He did hear, though, which led to Pochettino, in his pre-Japan press conference Monday, using an eight-letter word for animal excrement to describe some of the criticism he’d heard. His wife later pointed out to him how much more difficult the media generally were when he coached in France’s Ligue 1 and England’s Premier League, and that maybe he should be gentler with those reporters he encounters here.
MORE: Pochettino’s fiery pre-match press conference
“I’m so happy to be here. I’m so happy to be the coach in this country,” he said. “People are so nice. The fans were so nice here in Columbus.
“I love when you criticize and make an opinion, because sometimes you can observe something different, from a different perspective. I know this is good for us to see, and to read, and keep going in this way because that will make us better.”
In England, they call exhibition games “friendlies”, and not much could have been friendlier than Japan choosing to field a relatively young, inexperienced lineup when the USMNT were so desperate for some taste of success.
Japan coach Hajime Moriyasu told The Sporting News he wanted to use this opportunity to build some depth on his squad, which already has qualified for the World Cup. “We cannot just rely on the 11 players … we need two, maybe three teams that can play on the same high level,” he said.
Ranked No. 17 in the world by FIFA, Japan was the ninth top-30 opponent the USMNT have played since Pochettino first coached last October. If they’d fallen in this one, they’d have been on an eight-game losing streak in such games. Even with this, they’re 2-7.
That engendered a sense of desperation within the team’s fan base, if not inside the squad. The USMNT will not gather and play for another month, and they did not need to carry more negativity through that stretch before collecting again to prepare for next summer. Defeating Japan and creating four big chances, according to FotMob.com, and an expected goals total of 2.01 was invigorating.
“It was definitely important,” said star Christian Pulisic, who set up Balogun’s goal in the 64th minute with a perfect pass into the box. “Obviously a tough result in the last one, and going into today we wanted to put on a good performance and have a good feeling leaving this camp and moving forward.”
Pochettino promised before the game he would make some changes to his lineup, and shifting a 3-4-2-1 formation was the most obvious and significant. In the three-man back line, Tristan Blackmon joined captain Tim Ream and regular starter Chris Richards, who appeared only as a sub against Korea to guard against aggravating a minor injury. The change in shape empowered a number of players, particularly Alex Freeman at right wingback and Max Arfsten on the left, at last granted the opportunity to play the position in which he stars for the Columbus Crew.
As part of his process, Pochettino has used 59 different players in his first 12 months on the job, according to CBS Sports Golazo. The lineup against Japan was the 15th different group he’s presented in the past 18 games. Some of that was by design, the attempt to energize those regulars who mostly loafed through the March defeats in the Nations League final four against Panama and Canada. Some was by necessity, when multiple key players were unavailable for the Gold Cup because of injury, fatigue or Club World Cup commitments. Deciding to turn this window into still another platform for experimentation was not greeted warmly by the fan base that is eager to see momentum build toward next June.
To Pochettino’s point, though, bringing in the usual suspects might have eliminated Zendejas, who hadn’t appeared for the USMNT since last October and only has 13 caps at age 27. His sizzling, left-footed one-timer in the 30th minute, off a perfect cross from Arfsten, proved to be the game-winner. The coach said Zendejas’ performance gave him plenty to think about in preparing the roster for two more games in October.
“I just want to do my best, do my job, leave it all out there,” Zendejas told TSN. “That’s part of my DNA. Hopefully, it did fill his eye, and hopefully I’ll get more opportunities in the future.”
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