Being included on USMNT roster means Gio Reyna can rewrite his personal history at 2026 FIFA World Cup

On a day when his roster for the 2026 FIFA World Cup was announced, when the United States men’s national team could revel in its status as the home team and the public celebration of the 26 players as they were presented, manager Mauricio Pochettino appeared disinclined to say much about whom he had chosen and those excluded or how they’d all been informed of their status.

Then someone asked about young midfielder Gio Reyna.

And suddenly the man called “Poch” wasn’t so interested in abbreviation.

“I think we all know Gio has amazing talent – and experience, too,” Pochettino said in the press conference that followed the official USMNT roster announcement. “To play in a non-official game or to play in different competitions is not the same as to play in a World Cup. I think we need to trust in the players that have experience, and I think that is really important.

“During our process, we challenged these experienced players. Why? Because we wanted to get the best, we wanted to be competitive, we wanted to change this mindset. I think him, from the last time he was involved, he was fantastic. He can add different things to the team, he has the quality to stop the ball. I really trust in him.”

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Pochettino stressed that does not mean Reyna is assured a starting spot, and it’s interesting that we can trace the arrival of this USMNT manager to the last time this player was delivered this message.

Considered by many in the sport to be even more purely gifted than USMNT veterans Christian Pulisic, Tyler Adams, Sergino Dest, Weston McKennie and Tim Weah – all of them playing regularly in top European leagues – Reyna’s playing experience at the 2022 World Cup consisted of two appearances totaling 53 minutes. His general experience in Qatar was something altogether different. And the result was an episode that changed the direction of the USMNT.

The labeling of this group as a “Golden Generation” always was overstated, tied more to the beauty of alliteration than a realistic assessment of its stature on the world stage. But it once was at least a Bronze Bunch, capable of entering the conversation among World Cup threats the way Morocco did because of such players as Achraf Hakimi and Sofyan Amrabat.

What disrupted a similar progression from the Americans was the Reyna reality show that enveloped the USMNT at the end of 2022 and much of 2023. Now he has been presented an opportunity to reimagine his personal history, and possibly that of the national team, with his selection to this World Cup squad.

BONN: Breaking down the official USMNT World Cup roster for the 2026 FIFA tournament

With Reyna still only 23, his inclusion remains more a product of his promise than anything achieved for his country or club. He’s made just five appearances for the USMNT since the start of 2025 and scored one goal in those games; by contrast, Real Salt Lake’s industrious Diego Luna played 16 times for the national team in that period, starting nine, and delivered four goals and three assists.

In his first season with Borussia Monchengladbach in Germany’s Bundesliga, Reyna played in 19 league games, four of them starts, and scored one goal. He’s started only 10 league games in his past four club seasons.

Pochettino was quoted in Thursday’s broadcast program on Fox saying, “We don’t need the best players; we need the right players.” But choosing Reyna leans heavily on the former.

Even with three days to consider the USMNT roster before it was made official Tuesday, we still don’t have a firm idea of what this team will look like upon taking the field June 12 against Paraguay.

It’s jarring to look back four years – for example, through the lens of the HBO series “U.S. Against The World” – and recall how established the form and function of the USMNT was in advance of the 2022 World Cup at Qatar. It definitely was not a perfect team: young, inexperienced in World Cup play, lacking an established striker.

One can quarrel with the credentials of that team’s head coach, Gregg Berhalter, and legions did. And yet he clearly established in advance of the tournament how he wanted that group to play. They were aligned in a 4-3-3 formation with the midfield trio of Yunus Musah, Weston McKennie and Tyler Adams encouraged to control possession, more than any U.S. World Cup team ever had. They were to defend as a group and attempt to transform their dominance of the ball into sufficient scoring opportunities to gain the desired result.

They tied Wales after a single defensive mistake cost them despite their grip on the game; they fought to a draw against a more talented England squad and they broke through a more experienced Iran defense to gain the victory needed to advance. They allowed just one goal in group play; in the modern era starting in 1990, they gave up three or more (usually more) in all seven previous World Cups.

All that imploded after the United States were eliminated in the Round of 16 by the Netherlands, and more so once the controversy cycloned into public view regarding Reyna’s comportment in Qatar. Berhalter made comments at a private event about a player who’d nearly been sent home from the World Cup for “not meeting expectations on and off the field,” which reportedly included an obvious lack of effort in a closed-door exhibition game in advance of the tournament. Reyna later acknowledged in a statement he was "devastated" about being assigned a reserve role, although his phrasing spun that as "very limited".

After Berhalter’s comments were made public, and after intrepid American soccer writers verified Reyna to be the player in question, the coach’s tentative hold on his position never would be secure. The decision of Reyna’s mother to make a decades-old domestic abuse allegation against the coach known to the U.S. Soccer Federation led to a three-month investigation and another three-month gap before Berhalter was rehired. The team’s opportunity to build on the 2022 experience was shot.

It was interesting that Reyna, on Tuesday, was willing to acknowledge his disappointment at not playing more back then. “Yeah. I mean, of course, I think everyone wants to play every minute of every game, but sometimes it doesn’t work like that,” he told reporters after the roster was announced. “This time around, just want to do whatever it takes. Of course I want to play, but so do 26 guys. It’s never that simple. Whatever is called for by me, I’ll be willing to help.”

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Reyna has the ability, as Pochettino affirmed, to redirect the conversation about the USMNT from what was and what might have been to what is possible now, in 2026, with the World Cup being played in the nation where the majority of the players grew up. The manager has given him the chance by including him on the roster and expressed near boundless confidence in his ability.

“It means a lot. Obviously to have a World Cup on home soil means a lot. It’s a dream come true,” Reyna said. “At the end of the day, I want to repay him on the pitch and help this team be successful.

“Of course, a World Cup in America is always going to make headlines. I think, for me, it’s pretty simple: Try to keep the main thing the main thing.”