Of the four games in which the United States men’s national team competed at the 2022 World Cup, midfielder Gio Reyna appeared in just two for a total of 53 minutes.
There were 14 guys on the USMNT who got more time, which led Reyna to finally admit that the controversy which disrupted U.S. Soccer for the better part of a year, “I was just upset that, you know, I wasn’t really playing.”
It’s been nearly a full World Cup cycle — four years — since Qatar, which represents nearly a fifth of his time on Earth, so perhaps Reyna’s memory has faded over time.
Because all this began before the USMNT even took the field for the World Cup opener against Wales.
It was Reyna “not really playing” in a different sense – a lack of effort in practices and a pre-tournament scrimmage against a Qatari club team – that led to coach Gregg Berhalter and his staff debating whether to send him home and demanding he apologize to his teammates in order to be retained.
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After Berhalter’s actions on the World Cup training pitch became public in December 2022, Reyna’s family subsequently revealed to U.S. Soccer a decades-old secret about Berhalter’s relationship with his wife that compelled the federation to investigate an assertion of a domestic violence incident while they dated as North Carolina students.
Ultimately, after being off the job six months, Berhalter was returned to the position of USMNT head coach.
Fast forward to October, 2025 as James Ellingworth of the Associated Press spoke to Reyna about his attempts to rebuild his career toward competing in the 2026 World Cup. Now playing for Borussia Monchengladbach of Germany’s Bundesliga, Reyna has not played for the national team since March, and has just one international appearance since the early exit from the 2024 Copa America.
The AP asked if he’d have handled things differently if given another shot at 2022.
“Maybe in certain ways,” Reyna said, “but I’m not just going to sort of sit here and take all the blame for something that was made out to be completely my fault, which I believe it wasn’t, and also my family’s too.
“At the end of the day, I was just upset that, you know, I wasn’t really playing. I was playing at Dortmund. I thought that I wanted to play at the World Cup and ultimately, in the end, I didn’t do that. And that’s really what it stemmed from.”
This is not the first time Reyna has attempted to gerrymander the narrative regarding what occurred in Qatar.
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After the youngster’s experience at the World Cup was revealed by Berhalter at a private seminar — the coach did not identify the player who’d been disciplined, but multiple news organizations reported it was Reyna — he released a statement saying he was discouraged because Berhalter told him in advance his role at the World Cup would be “very limited.”
Anyone who’s covered sports for any period of time could see the disingenuity in that statement. Coaches challenge their players to compete for opportunities; they don’t provide them the excuse to relent. In the United States’ 4-3-3 formation, the midfield of Weston McKennie, Tyler Adams and Yunus Musah had been firmly established, and it followed logical reasoning that Reyna’s early role would be as a substitute, particularly if the U.S. needed his creativity to help push for a tying or winning goal. In the event of injury or underperformance by one of the midfielders or wingers, though, a starting opportunity would not have been placed out of his reach.
Three-and-a-half years later, now 22 years old and a seasoned professional, he’s at it again.
Long considered by many analysts to be the most gifted young USMNT player, Reyna has seen his burgeoning career diminished by a series of injuries that led to him falling out of Borussia Dortmund’s rotation, and then its future plans.
Since moving during the offseason to Monchengladbach, one of the weakest teams in the Bundesliga, Reyna has made four league appearances and started one game. He has not scored or assisted in his 31 minutes per game. He told the AP he wants to re-establish himself with the USMNT and new coach Mauricio Pochettino in advance of the 2026 World Cup, which will be contested primarily in the United States, by performing well with his new club.
“I think Pochettino was very clear with saying, ‘You need to play, perform and then if you do that then you have a good chance to come in again,’” Reyna told the AP. “It’s all on me now.
“I do obviously think about it pretty often, as it’s somewhere where I need and want to be,” he told the AP. “But I try to focus daily here, stay present here, work here every day and, hopefully, believe everything will fall into place.”
Reyna did not aid in that effort by again trying to reallocate blame for what happened in Qatar. Even though he claims it’s all on him now, has he truly embraced that idea if he can’t accept responsibility for his past disappointments?
He hasn’t provided anyone justification lately to trust his performances, and neither is he giving the new USMNT coaches enough reason to trust him. A spot at the 2026 World Cup feels miles away.
