Pochettino says US men’s players should aspire to achieve like American women

NEW YORK (AP) — Mauricio Pochettino views the U.S. women’s team as the example for his men.

“I think that is going to be our inspiration,” he said. “That is the objective to match.”

Pochettino held a 48-minute introductory news conference Friday, three days after he agreed to coach the Americans through the 2026 World Cup and two days after he landed in the United States. The 52-old Argentine replaced Gregg Berhalter, fired from his second term on July 10 after the Americans were eliminated in the Copa America’s first round.

“We are here because we want to win. We are winners,” Pochettino said. “We are going to compete, and compete is completely different than to play.”

His first games will be friendlies against Panama on Oct. 12 at Austin, Texas, and at Mexico three days later. While the U.S. men haven’t reached the World Cup semifinals since the initial tournament in 1930 and haven’t gotten to the quarterfinals since 2002, the American women have won four World Cups and five Olympic gold medals.

Wearing a dark suit, white dress shirt with no tie and a pocket square, Pochettino was flanked by U.S. Soccer Federation President Cindy Parlow Cone — a world champion and two-time gold medalist — CEO JT Batson and sporting director Matt Crocker.

“One of the most important things that we need to be inspired by is the women’s team,” Pochettino said.

He coached Spain’s Espanyol (2009-12), England’s Southampton (2013-14), Tottenham (2014-19) and Chelsea (2023-24) and France’s Paris Saint-Germain (2021-22), winning a French league title. Crocker knew Pochettino from their time together at Southampton, where Crocker was academy director.

“He would pretty much physically hug everybody in the club,” Crocker recalled.

At Stamford Bridge, Pochettino worked alongside Emma Hayes, who won seven league crowns while managing Chelsea from 2012 until becoming the U.S. women’s coach last spring. She helped recruit her former colleague.

“I didn’t need to ask. She explained everything,” Pochettino said.

Hayes ran her first U.S. practice on May 28 and led the Americans to an Olympic gold medal 74 days later.

“I was teasing Poch that it only took Emma two months to win an Olympic gold medal, so I’m curious what he’s going to do in two months,” Cone said. “We want to set ourselves up for being able to win any game that we are in.”

Pochettino is heading a national team for the first time, becoming the 10th U.S. coach in 14 years and its first foreign-born leader since Jurgen Klinsmann from 2011-16.

“We need to believe that we can win, that we can win not only a game, we can win the World Cup, because if not it’s going to be so difficult the journey,” Pochettino said. “We want players that arrive on the day one in the training camp thinking big.”

Pochettino isn’t going to judge players by poor performances in a pair of September friendlies and he said the 637 days before their 2026 World Cup opener was sufficient time to prepare.

He is likely to have his full player pool available for just eight one-week training periods before the team gathers ahead of the World Cup.

“Everyone thinks that there is no time to prepare,” he said. “I am in the opposite side. I believe that there is time enough. ... I don’t want to create an excuse for the players to say, oh, yeah, but now we don’t have time to buy the new ideas, the new philosophy.”

Talks began in Barcelona in July.

“We spent a lot of time with him,” Cone said, “just being as open and honest and transparent about the good, the bad, the ugly of U.S. soccer and what he was stepping into because we wanted, if he chose to come here, we wanted him to know exactly what he was getting into, what he was up against, where the opportunities were, and Emma played a huge part in that.”

Negotiations were complicated by the need to settle his previous contract with Chelsea and club officials concentrating on the Aug. 30 transfer deadline and then going on vacation. USSF officials could afford Pochettino’s salary only with the help of gifts from hedge fund and asset management firm heads.

“Unless he was willing to work for much less,” Cone said.

While some have proclaimed the current men’s group the most talented the U.S. has produced, Pochettino was more restrained and said “it’s a very good generation of players.”

“We have very talented players. I think, of course, the confidence was a little bit low after the Copa America,” he opined. “We need to show that we play as a collective on the pitch.”

Pochettino dined at Fasano Fifth Avenue on Thursday night with American soccer stakeholders that included Major League Soccer Commissioner Don Garber, Los Angeles FC co-managing owner Larry Berg, Philadelphia Union chairman Jay Sugarman and vice chairman Richard Leibovitch. He plans to travel with USSF officials to Atlanta next week to search for housing near the office and training complex under construction in Fayetteville, Georgia.

His news conference — on Friday the 13th, for those who are superstitious — was in a Warner Bros. Discovery screening room at 30 Hudson Yards on the far west side of Manhattan, just eight blocks from Berhalter’s introduction at Glasshouse Chelsea on Dec. 4, 2018.

Pochettino is bringing along his longtime staff, assistant coaches Jesús Pérez and Miguel d’Agostino, and goalkeeper coach Toni Jiménez, and will hire at least one addition.

While Pochettino spoke in accented English, he conversed mostly in Spanish when he arrived at Southampton and Pérez was among his interpreters. Pochettino was perturbed when he heard the translation at a news conference after saying he felt “contento.”

“I am not `over the moon.′ Why do you say `over the moon?’” he remembered.

Now Pochettino says his family is indeed “over the moon” about the move to America.

“If I am happy, I am motivated,” he said. “My family has seen me in the last few weeks, few months I think with fire in my eyes,” he said, pointing to his face. “That is the most important thing.”

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