How American football landed the star coach Mauricio Pochettino

Austin, Texas – Before New coach Mauricio Pochettino had even left the locker room for one of his first training sessions with the American male football team, many of his players have already been bathed in sweat.

Under Pochettino, even stretching has taken a new accent.

“Everything seems a little more intense,” said striker Ricardo Pepi after a practice. “The exercises all have a goal. Everything has a goal. “

“Everything we do,” added striker Josh Sargent, “he wants it to be intense. This is the big message so far.”

But this is not the only message that the new coach delivered during his first week with the United States during team meetings, on the training field and during individual visits which took place from 10 minutes to half an hour, another theme became clear for the 25 players invited to the first Pochettino camp.

“He wants to win,” said defender Tim Ream. “He has his principles. He has his ideas. But at the end of the day, it's about winning.”

Pochettino did a lot of this, first as a defender with clubs in Argentina, Spain and France and with the Argentine national team, then as a manager in Southampton, Tottenham, Paris Saint-Germain and Chelsea. He will have his chance to rely on this Saturday when the United States meets Panama in Q2 Stadium in Austin in his first match as a national team coach. The team will then fly to Guadalajara for a friend with Mexico on Tuesday.

However, his hiring last month represents something of a bet for an American football federation who has not left the country for a coach of the male national team for more than three decades.

“Much of this was new to us, right?” Said JT Batson, managing director of US Soccer. “It was a big project and a big process and a process where you had to do things well.”

Especially given the timing. THE The World Cup returns to the United States In less than two years, leaving the Federation with a unique opportunity to arouse generalized interest in football. If the Americans take place deeply in the tournament, the thought goes, the fans and the dollars of sponsorship will follow.

An early outing, on the other hand, and interest will decrease.

“It's a huge thing for us,” said Batson. “People have to believe in what we do and be excited and motivated to transport sport on the positive trajectory on which it is.”

Pochettino was not so hired to continue the program's trajectory as much as it should transform it. The team stagnated under Gregg BerhalterWho had the best percentage of victories of any American coach in history in his first four years, but then lost almost as often as he won in the last two. After a Disastrous performance in American Copa last summerwhere the United States was eliminated in the group phase, Theft which was dismissed.

“We have had an extent of difficult results”, Christian Pulisicsaid one of the most vocal donors in Berhalter, before the training session on Friday. “I guess the change was necessary and that's what we have. Now we have a little change and the only thing we can do is looking forward, bringing the excitement and getting out and getting results.”

Making a change was only half of the equation. To put the team on the right track, the Federation had to hire someone better than Berhalter. Thus, Batson and Matt Crocker, the sports director of US Soccer, who directed the search for the new coach, threw a large net, starting with a list of more than 100 candidates.

Mauricio Pochettino led Chelsea before separating from the club and finally won the job at the head of the American national male team.

(Alastair Grant / Associated Press)

This list was quickly reduced, the remaining names placed in three buckets – two of which reported ESPN, were considered to be candidates “within” or “super extensive”.

At the top of this second list was old Liverpool coach Jurgen Kloppwho quickly refused the work. But as the word spread that American football – supported by annual commercial income which could exceed $ 200 million, according to Inside World Football – was ambitious in its research, others expressed their interest.

Soon, the list of candidates would have included Herve Renard, coach of the French women's team; The former manager of England Gareth Southgate; The former coach of Nice and Crystal Palace, Patrick Vieira,; And the well -traveled German director Thomas Tuchel, who led some of the largest clubs in Europe, including Borussia Dortmund, PSG, Chelsea and Bayern Munich.

“The organization is in a place radically different from what it was a few years ago and that means that the types of interested candidates are evolving,” said Batson. “Our organization was in a much stronger position. You had this general excitement about the team, the growth of sport, opportunities in the future.

“When you superimpose these things together, the types of people who answered your telephone call this time were different. We wanted to make sure that we had a plan to get the most out.”

The plan was largely guided with the data compiled by the American football analysis service, Batson said. The factors considered important were communication skills; comfort dealing with media, sponsors and fans; A story to win in different environments; and an ability to be strategically flexible.

This last factor was particularly essential because many of the names in the list of candidates were club coaches who, with a national team, could no longer go out and buy players who correspond to their favorite style.

“For a national team,” said Batson, “you have the player (s) you have. There is a finished swimming pool.”

In a few weeks, the research process guided the federation towards Pochettino, which had won three trophies in 18 months as a PSG manager has been sandwiching between stays with Tottenham and Chelsea in the English Premier League. Almost as important was the fact that the 17 months of Pochettino in Southampton ride the time to crocker there as a technical director, giving the search part an additional overview of the operation of the coach and allowing to crocker to reach out directly to Pochettino.

The next obstacle has been to have the 52 -year -old man signed. He separated from Chelsea in May, half a two-year contract, worth more than $ 26 million. In three of his last four jobs of coaches, Pochettino lasted less than two seasons, but what complicated his departure from Chelsea, it was a buy -up clause and his coaches – most of whom followed him in the United States – to allow a large part of their salary if they accepted another coach position.

It took us football, Chelsea and the coach's time to find a solution that would not cost Pochettino the 13 million full dollars that were due to him before being able to answer the following question: how much to allow football to pay it? Jurgen Klinsmann was the best paid coach in the history of American football when he won $ 3.2 million in 2014, almost a million more than Berhalter was paid in 2022.

Pochettino did almost four times in his only season in Chelsea. To fill this gap, American football has asked for help, funding what would be an agreement of $ 12 million over two years with the donations of the billionaire in the Hédéculative Kenneth C. Griffin, the Capital Diameter Scott Goodwin and others.

“People have tempted their hand and said,” Hey, we want to support, “said Batson.” We had business partners, we had donors, other stakeholders saying: “Everything you need”. “

Less than a week after the start of work, the new coach already has an impact.

“You can just see the buzz and excitement,” said midfielder Brenden Aaronson.

However, if this translates into results could take some time to respond.

“Our first camp is to know each other,” said Pocsettino on Friday at a 30 -minute meeting with around fifty journalists in which he answered questions in English and Spanish. “To settle the way we want to work, it is the most important thing. We have to give the team time to adapt. We are so much, so satisfied with our decision to come here. The challenge of creating a team, to know us, is today at the World Cup. ”