Mauricio Pochettino did not expect the job to be this hard. Speaking at a media roundtable Tuesday night at a clifftop hotel in Dana Point, California, the U.S. men's national team coach said he underestimated the scale of the rebuild when he signed his contract nearly two years ago.
"We were so naive when we signed our contract," Pochettino said, according to ABC News. "I think what we find after we sign, we misjudged the situation. It was worse than we really believed."
Pochettino had never previously coached a national team. While he understood that the job would limit his contact with players, he did not anticipate how deep the problems in the program ran. The U.S. had just been eliminated from the 2024 Copa America in the group stage while playing on home soil, a result that led to the firing of his predecessor, Gregg Berhalter. Pochettino described inheriting a program weighed down by complacency.
"When we arrived here, we received a big punch, and we were knocked out for a while," he said. "Because we were so excited about that. It's so close, the World Cup. Everyone is going to want to be involved and want to come to the national team, and it was the opposite."
Pochettino built his reputation as a manager at top clubs in England, France, and Spain after a playing career that took him from Argentina to Europe. He described himself as someone who moves toward challenges rather than waiting for conditions to improve. During the roundtable, he gestured to the surfers visible from his terrace and noted that they spend their time waiting for a perfect wave that never comes. He said that is not his approach.
After absorbing the scope of the problem, Pochettino said he focused on building a new culture and identifying which players were most important to the team's success. Those efforts appear to be producing results. The U.S. opened the 2026 World Cup with consecutive victories over Paraguay and Australia, winning by a combined score of 6-1. According to ABC News, the U.S. had never before started a World Cup 2-0, and the team had won only one known knockout-round match in its history prior to Pochettino's tenure.
The home World Cup, which the U.S. is co-hosting, gives the program a chance to perform in front of its own fans at the highest level of international soccer. Pochettino's team will continue group stage play with more matches ahead as the tournament moves forward through the bracket.
