Whether coach Mauricio Pochettino leaves the U.S. men’s soccer team to become Manchester United’s new manager remains to be seen. For now, it’s business as usual for an American squad preparing for its first test of the 2030 FIFA World Cup cycle.
Pochettino has over the last 48 hours emerged as a favorite to replace the embattled Michael Carrick at the helm of the Premier League titans, per multiple reports in England. Many of the USA’s top players were arriving in metro Atlanta, where the Stars and Stripes are training ahead of their upcoming Concacaf Nations League quarterfinal series against Haiti, when word of a possible change in leadership began to get around.
“That news kind of got sprung on all of us along with the rest of the world today,” veteran U.S. defender Antonee “Jedi” Robinson admitted when he spoke to reporters before the Americans trained on Tuesday morning. “But that never seems to leak into the work we do.”
More than two years into his tenure, U.S. players are used to Pochettino being linked to high-profile club vacancies. The 54-year-old Argentine, who previously led Chelsea, Tottenham and Southampton in the planet’s top domestic league, has been courted by multiple suitors since taking over the Stars and Stripes in September 2024, he told me and other members just before the 2026 World Cup. AC Milan approached Poch about its opening just before the tournament; ironically enough, the seven-time European champs hired former Man United boss Ruben Amorim instead.
Mauricio Pochettino is being eyed for potentially taking over at Manchester United. (Photo by Al Sermeno/ISI Photos/ISI Photos via Getty Images)
In August, three weeks after the Americans’ 4-1 loss to Belgium in the World Cup round of 16, Pochettino signed a new four-year contract with the U.S. Soccer Federation. But that pact includes a release clause in the neighborhood of $10 million, per The Athletic — a pittance for United. (Global soccer’s third-richest club has a value of more than $7 billion, according to Forbes.)
With the next World Cup still almost four years away, Pochettino’s return to Europe feels significantly more likely this time around. Even after inking his current pact, he spoke openly about his desire to coach again in England. Even with 20-time league champions United languishing in the relegation zone, an opportunity to lead the Red Devils might be impossible to refuse.
For now, the USA is still Pochettino’s team.
The first match of the two-game, total-goals-wins series vs. Les Grenadiers is Saturday in Miami, with the decisive second leg in Cincinnati on Nov. 17. The victor will advance to the Nations League final four in March in Inglewood, California.
Alongside mainstays like Robinson and Christian Pulisic, Poch recalled teenagers Cavan Sullivan, Julian Hall and others after they helped the Americans win all four of their exhibition contests in September and October.
“Mauricio has taken me under his wing in the most tremendous way possible,” Sullivan told me when I asked him about Pochettino. “Everybody loves him.”
And right now, they’re not thinking that this could be their last camp together.
“As soccer players, we’re pretty used to fast-changing environments,” Jedi told me when asked how they prevent the noise surrounding Pochettino’s future from becoming a distraction.
“We’re all very good at just focusing on the next task at hand.
“For me personally,” he added, “I’m going to do everything I can to be ready to play for him, how he wants us to play, until told otherwise.”
