USMNT’s World Cup draw lays perfect path for groundbreaking summer

WASHINGTON, D.C. – No matter the nation, no matter its potential and no matter its background, national teams meet six months before a World Cup hoping a favorable draw. As a selection of America’s most prominent athletes randomly chose one country after another from a bowl, it was hard not to feel like the U.S. men’s national team was receiving a version of a best-case scenario. There were no difficult teams to face in the group stage, the natural result of securing a place in Pot 1 as host nation. They also drew teams against whom they have very valuable – and very recent – ​​experience.

First came Australia, the team they beat 2-1 in October. Then came Paraguay, the team they beat 2-1 in November. At the end, a twist occurred: a small piece of paper with the names of four teams written on it, the quartet preparing to face off in a playoff in March for one of the few remaining tickets to the World Cup. Romania, Slovakia and Kosovo make up three-quarters of this group while fourth is Turikye, a team the USMNT faced in a 2-1 defeat in June.

“I think we can go into this match with a good feeling,” Christian Pulisic said a few hours after the draw. “Of course, we’ve played these teams recently, which isn’t always the case, so we know more or less what they’re going to be like and we also know that they’re tough opponents. We’re not going to take anyone lightly. They’re all going to be tough games, but I think it’s great that we have that experience. Obviously they’ve played against us too, so they’re in the same boat but that’s cool. It’s cool that these friendlies and some of the others were able to give us a chance. prepare for some of the teams we’re going to face.”

Winners and losers of the 2026 World Cup draw: USMNT’s Mauricio Pochettino is a clear winner; The Netherlands experiences a difficult draw

James Bengé

If they face a familiar trio next summer, the group stage opponents will serve perfectly as benchmarks for the team’s progress over the past few months as head coach Mauricio Pochettino finally transforms the team according to his vision. You can almost look at Connecticut’s 2-1 loss to Turkiye as the exact moment things started to change for Pochettino’s side – he had plenty of new faces in the mix just before the Concacaf Gold Cup, a month-long camp in which the head coach began to establish his principles. As the matches against Australia and Paraguay progressed, Pochettino launched different versions of a defensive trio that allowed the team to really shine and finish 2025 on a five-game unbeaten run.

“I think if you watch the friendly against Turkey before the Gold Cup, I think you saw a lot of new faces, also a lot of experience but also a lot of hunger,” Chris Richards said. “I think we still played one of the best teams in Europe and were unlucky with two goals, but definitely goals we could avoid. I think that gave us a lot of confidence going into the Gold Cup and I think after that playing teams like Australia, who are one of the best teams in their division, played them again and beat them, and then Paraguay, you saw the same thing so I think it just shows this summer, in friendlies, that you can still improve, but also with new faces added, with new systems, with new styles of play, things like that It shows that we are very versatile and that we are also a very difficult team to play, no matter who comes on the pitch.

The fact that there is a lot of rotation in the squad and several different playing styles that Pochettino can realistically choose from makes the USMNT a tricky opponent, even for those who feel they have a sense of familiarity.

“I think it’s good to have different options, obviously depending on the opponents, depending on how we want to play, who’s available and I think we’ve done a good job of that,” Pulisic said. “I think we showed we can play in different ways, so for me I see that as a positive and it makes it harder for them. They won’t know what to expect.”

There is, however, one difference that stands out above the rest: the fact that the World Cup is a series of now-or-never opportunities that friendlies simply cannot replicate.

“I think we will play in different contexts, different circumstances and of course the schedule is different,” Pochettino said. “We are going to arrive with the same confidence and the same form. That’s why. It’s a good thing that we are competing[d] against Paraguay and Australia in a very good way, again, very good teams and of course, [there is] Turkey, [could] but there are three others who are going to challenge Turkiye too… but I think it’s good, the benchmark, because we’re going to feel like we can beat them but at the same time, when you beat someone or when you hurt someone, they’re waiting for you. They might say, “But now we’ll see.” When it gets serious, it will be the World Cup. That’s why. Caution. We must be [cautious]”.

In an effort to be on the safe side, the USMNT will naturally start scouting their opponents as soon as possible, but the oddity of a lengthy qualifying campaign means there is plenty of work to do for Pochettino and company.

“The problem is rather [than] “To have three teams to scout, we have two plus four because we have to scout all four,” Pochettino said. “Between now and March we are going to amplify the number of teams that we have to look at because now we have, of course, Australia and Paraguay, but we have to add four more teams, be ready, all the analysts and start working now because we can’t wait until March and start working, right? We have to be ready from now on.”

Pochettino was also surprisingly moved by the fact that decisive moments don’t just exist for teams as a whole at World Cups, but for each individual who takes part.

“My dream has always been to go to the World Cup, to play for my national team, Argentina, and to compete in a World Cup,” he said. “There were times in my career when I thought it wouldn’t happen, but [then] it happened and [at] At 31, I had the opportunity to play in the World Cup and it disappeared so quickly. I don’t think I [didn’t] do everything and I didn’t do enough with the possibility of doing better but it’s true that through my experience, because after that, I suffer from massive depression because it’s like your biggest dream has disappeared and then you feel that [there’s] there will be no other possibility to get involved in this and this, for me, is the most powerful energy that I want to transmit to people, to players. Please do whatever you [can]. Be humble enough and try to build, with your teammates, good energy, good dynamics.”

Caution or not, the draw provided a perfect basis for the USMNT to achieve the breakthrough performance it has always aimed for next summer in hopes of further accelerating soccer’s growth in a country that has been slow to embrace the world’s most popular sport. There’s officially no excuse they can fall back on, especially since things are trending in the right direction for them with a year-end unbeaten streak. The onus is well and truly on the World Cup hosts to well and truly live up to the potential that many had spotted in them years earlier.

“Potentially we’ve played all three of these teams in the last six months, but that can be a bit of a false sense of security,” Tim Ream said. “We have to make sure that we don’t have that kind of sense of security creeping in and we have enough guys with enough experience that know how to continue to push themselves, to push each other and to push the team in the right direction knowing what we could do, but again, it’s up to us and our work and our intensity and our focus.”