After being hired in September, Mauricio Pochettino has only ten international windows – nine regular FIFA dates, plus the 2025 Gold Cup – to prepare the U.S. men’s national team for the 2026 World Cup. After each window, “Ten Windows” will dig into key developments and chart the USMNT’s progress towards 2026. Two down, eight to go.
Results this window:
USA 1, Jamaica 0 (Pepi 5); USA 4, Jamaica 2 (Pulisic 13, Own Goal 33, Pepi 42, Weah 56; Gray 53, 68)
The story this window:
The Pochettino concept has its glorious 45 minutes of proof.
No one writes Keatsian odes to own-goals. But for the USMNT’s second goal against Jamaica Monday night, we should find a poet who’ll make an exception.
The move starts with Tim Ream picking off a Jamaican pass 10 yards outside his own box and finding Weston McKennie, dropping deep from his nominal No. 10 role. McKennie plays a one-touch pass under pressure to Mark McKenzie, who plays a one-touch pass to Joe Scally along the right touchline. Scally plays a well-timed infield ball to Yunus Musah, drifting centrally from his role on the U.S. right as McKennie sprints into the space vacated by Musah down the right wing. Musah turns and expertly finds an advancing Christian Pulisic, who releases the streaking McKennie into the widest of open spaces.
From there, you can see what McKennie, Tanner Tessman, and a reappearing Pulisic combine to do (or in Tessman’s case, cleverly not do):
ANOTHER ONE. @pulisic's deflected shot doubles the lead!#USMNT x @VW pic.twitter.com/wtvIEo241F
— U.S. Soccer Men's National Team (@USMNT) November 19, 2024
Own-goal, schmown-goal: those 20 seconds of defense-into-attack-into-doubled-lead showcased like no other moment of the nascent Pochettino era what U.S. Soccer’s smash coaching hire promises to bring the program.
Positional versatility, teamwide collective understanding of how to apply that versatility on the fly, confidence and composure on the ball, the final bit of ingenuity in the attacking third to turn a good chance into a great one… everything PochettinoBall claims to provide on paper, in that goal the USMNT delivered on the field.
Considering the goal came both a mere 3.5 games into Pochettino’s tenure and as part of an eye-popping three-goal first-half barrage to put what could’ve been a tricky Nations League quarterfinal to bed, you’ll forgive USMNT fans for pinching themselves as the teams went into halftime. For 45 minutes, everything they’d dreamed about since the Pochettino hire became official – well, everything they’d dreamed about regarding the U.S.’s ability to stylishly crush Concacaf opposition when the need arose, anyway – had come true.
