Fort Lauderdale (United States) (AFP) – USA national team coach Mauricio Pochettino has been quick to praise the quality of American players but says he wants to inject some Argentine spirit and patriotism into his squad. The former Tottenham Hotspur manager has spent this week working in South Florida with a group of mainly domestic-based MLS players ahead of a friendly against Venezuela on Saturday.
And while impressed with the way MLS’s standard of play has improved in recent years, the Argentine says he would like his team to show the kind of relentless desire to win that the world champions have made their trademark. “One thing from Argentina that I can apply here, it is so simple but, it is the way they compete,” he told reporters after training at Inter Miami’s facility. “The Argentine players compete, the mentality. When you lose a ball, you cry. When you lose a game, you spend maybe one week in your room and don’t want to go out.
“How do you defend your badge, your flag? How do you defend your identity, your culture? I think that is what we want to translate. Because when you play for your national team and you are listening to your anthem, you need to feel something in your skin, inside yourself,” he said. Pochettino, who also worked at Paris St Germain and Chelsea before heading Stateside in September, believes that such patriotic pride can impact on performance.
“If you feel that, I don’t know the percentage that you are going to give more, but for sure it is 1 or 5 or 10% more. You are going to have an extra energy, an extra everything,” he said. The 52-year-old, dressed in the American coach look of baseball cap and tracksuit, said he had no doubt that his players can bring such an attitude. “We are capable to feel that. We have the quality and the capacity. We are professional, so professional. We have discipline. I think we can build a very competitive team,” he said.
The USA will co-host the World Cup in June 2026 with Mexico and Canada and before that tournament will have the chance to compete for a title in CONCACAF’s Nations League Finals in March and the Gold Cup in June. For Saturday’s game and Wednesday’s friendly with Costa Rica in Orlando, Pochettino is not able to call on his European-based players such as AC Milan winger Christian Pulisic, because the games are outside of FIFA’s official dates for games.
The games also come during a busy transfer window which has already seen one of his January squad, left-back John Tolkin, move from New York Red Bulls to Bundesliga club Holstein Kiel. Several other members of his broader squad have either moved or are in talks over transfers and Pochettino says that despite only being in the job for less than six months, the players have consulted with him and his staff over the moves. “It’s nice because it means that they trust us,” he said. “If they want us, we are part of giving advice. I think for us that means a lot,” he added.
© 2024 AFP
