Who is Pochettino? Is this a coup for the USMNT? Will it help them at the World Cup?
The United States men’s national soccer team got a huge boost Thursday morning when Mauricio Pochettino agreed to become the new head coach.
The Athletics revealed that Pochettino, who was a prime target for the opening, had signed a deal with US Soccer, the sports governing body. Pochettino has never managed at international level, but he is a highly respected name in club sport.
This is a big name arriving for a men’s World Cup that the US will co-host with neighbours Canada and Mexico in 2026, where the bulk of the matches will be played, including all the games from the quarter-finals onwards. But who is Pochettino? How big a coup is this? What is his style of play?
Here, The AthleticsJack Pitt-Brooke answers everything you need to know about the 52-year-old Argentine.
Who is Mauricio Pochettino anyway?
Mauricio Pochettino is considered one of the best managers in European football.
As a player, he was a highly competitive central defender, who left his native Argentina at the age of 22 to play for Barcelona-based Espanyol in Spain, after which he had brief spells in France with Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Bordeaux, before returning to Espanyol to finish his playing career. He played for Argentina at the 2002 World Cup, winning 20 caps in total.
Pochettino, left, playing for Espanyol (Luis Bagu/Getty Images)
Pochettino also began his coaching career at Espanyol in 2009, where he built a reputation for playing gutsy, high-pressing football with young players, turning the team’s fortunes around and saving them from relegation to Spain’s second division. His next job was at Southampton in the English Premier League in 2013, where he took the team to new heights with his energetic style of play. He then moved to Tottenham Hotspur the following year, where he oversaw their greatest sustained run of the modern era, finishing third, second and third in successive seasons in the Premier League, as well as reaching the 2018–19 Champions League final.
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Since then, Pochettino has been manager of PSG, winning the French Cup and the Ligue 1 title. Last season, he was head coach of Chelsea, where he guided the club to sixth place in the Premier League. That was enough to qualify for European football next season and for the final of the Carabao Cup.
How much of a coup is this for the USMNT?
It’s great to have one of the best coaches in the club world to coach the men’s national team.
Perhaps the best comparison is Jurgen Klinsmann, the former Germany striker who coached the USMNT from 2011 to 2016, but Pochettino comes to the job with a far greater track record in European club football management than he did. Klinsmann had only had one disappointing season at Bayern Munich (2008-09) before taking the United States job, and he led hosts Germany to the semi-finals of the 2006 World Cup.
Pochettino, on the other hand, has been one of the most impressive coaches in European club football over the past 15 years.
What he achieved at Tottenham still ranks as one of the best management periods of recent years, even though it failed to win the club any silverware.
Why would Pochettino take an international job?
Pochettino has always been a romantic with a passion for the history of sport.
He knows that the World Cup is the pinnacle of the game. As a boy, he remembers Argentina winning the 1978 (as hosts) and 1986 World Cups, with Diego Maradona becoming his lifelong hero. He is immensely proud of his participation in the 2002 World Cup, even though he is remembered by some for giving away the decisive penalty in a 1-0 group stage defeat to England — he still has a photo of that dubious ‘foul’ he committed on Michael Owen, signed by the England striker, on a wall at home.
Pochettino ‘faulted’ Owen during 2002 World Cup (Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
He told me in an interview in 2022 how much the World Cup means to him. “You don’t think about anything, you don’t think about money, you just think about giving your best performance and making the people happy,” Pochettino said. “Because you know very well that your country is behind you. The feeling is completely different from other competitions. That’s why the players feel so different.”
Pochettino told me that “of course” he would like to manage a World Cup one day, and not necessarily with Argentina, saying: “You never know what happens. I’m open to anything.”
What about club football?
Since being sacked by Tottenham in November 2019 after the club’s poor start to the season, Pochettino has worked for two of Europe’s most famous and wealthy clubs: PSG and Chelsea.
In Paris, he managed Neymar, Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappe, one of the most high-quality front lines ever assembled at club level. Ultimately, he performed in line with most PSG coaches before and after him, and was sacked at the end of the 2021-22 season.
He was brought to Chelsea last summer to impose a new style of play on their oversized team and after a rocky start, he eventually arrived, setting them up for a stunning finish to the season (they won their last five games, scoring 14 goals) and winning over fans who had initially doubted him due to his connections to London rivals Tottenham. He eventually left Chelsea in June with his reputation enhanced.
But both were difficult experiences at times, with a lot of internal politics to manage. European club football is in a strange situation at the moment, with not many clubs offering their managers/head coaches the chance to build something.
That would be one of the attractions of taking on a very different challenge with the U.S. national team.
What kind of football does he play?
Throughout his coaching career, Pochettino has sought to instill a bold, aggressive, high-pressing style in his teams.
It is a positional game, focused on maintaining good structure in and out of possession, so that players are in the right places to win the ball back quickly — ideally within three seconds — when his team loses it. He wants his teams to dominate the ball and defend high up the pitch.
Pochettino’s Tottenham were masters of this style of play and took the North London club to new heights.
At their best, a Pochettino team is physically unforgiving, powerful and dominant, and gives the opposition no breathing space. With PSG, it wasn’t always possible to play exactly like that, with a big-name forward line that wasn’t always willing to press up front. But in the second half of last season, Chelsea started to look like a Pochettino team, and the wins followed.
Are these methods suitable for international football?
Fitness work is hugely important for Pochettino and his coaching staff, but the nature of the international game means that coaches can’t work with their players for that long. It’s harder for them to improve their players as individuals, something Pochettino has always been big on, during those short periods together before they return to their clubs.
Pochettino with his players at PSG (Franck Fife/AFP via Getty Images)
For him it has always been important to help young players to get through, something he did from the beginning at Espanyol and later at Southampton.
When he was discussed as a potential England manager not so long ago, it was highlighted how many of their current squad owe their careers to their development under Pochettino: Luke Shaw (Southampton), Harry Kane, Kyle Walker, Kieran Trippier (Tottenham), Conor Gallagher and Cole Palmer (Chelsea). He hopes to develop a similar generation of youngsters now that he has the USMNT job.
How does he deal with the critical eye that this role entails?
Pochettino is used to the media attention, especially after his stints at PSG and Chelsea. But international football is different. There will certainly be less day-to-day attention than during his days at those clubs, but there will be times when Pochettino has the eyes of hundreds of millions of Americans on him. The American public is unlikely to be forgiving if they feel the team is not going in the right direction as the 2026 World Cup approaches.
But that’s part of the appeal, given what a huge event it will be in two years. Coaching that team in their home World Cup, in front of 70,000 for their opening group stage match at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles on June 12, 2026, will be the equivalent of being in front of the entire world.
Does it matter that he’s not American?
The team has had non-American coaches before, and not just Klinsmann. There was Bora Milutinovic, from Serbia, in the early 1990s, the last time the U.S. hosted the World Cup. Men from Poland, Greece, the U.K. and more have also held the job. There’s no reason that nationality should be a barrier for Pochettino in the role. He’s worked for three different Premier League clubs, and while he initially served as an interpreter at Southampton, his English is now certainly good enough to work in the U.S.
The most important thing is to show dedication to American soccer and a deep knowledge of all the players at his disposal, whether they play in MLS, Europe or elsewhere. This means a lot of hard work and air miles to get to know them all.
How much does this increase the USMNT’s chances at the 2026 World Cup?
It is difficult to say how proven club managers will fare in the international game. They are essentially two different formats of the same sport.
Antonio Conte, a serial club title winner, improved Italy but could only guide them to the quarter-finals of Euro 2016. Luis Enrique had a great European Championship with Spain in 2021, reaching the semi-finals, but they were knocked out of the World Cup in the last 16 by Morocco the following year. Hansi Flick won the treble with Bayern in 2020 but could not even get Germany out of the group in Qatar.
Predicting international tournaments is nearly impossible, given how thin the margins between success and failure are at that level. But what we can say is that Pochettino will bring fresh ideas, energy and proven methods to the American court, as well as a sense of confidence and optimism that the entire country can benefit from.
(Top photo: Getty Images; design: Eamonn Dalton)
