Jeff Rueter

This year’s Copa América will be closely watched, but the ensuing Olympic Games in Paris will have just as much to say about the broader state of the U.S. men’s player pool. Unlike the women’s side of the Olympic tournament, the men’s competition relies on players under the age of 23, though every team is allowed to bring up to three over-age players in the 18-man squad. Advertisement If the team that U.S. Olympic coach Marko Mitrović selects comes close to matching the program-best 4th place fi…

Recently retired midfielder Megan Rapinoe responded strongly on Wednesday to anti-LGBTQ content reposted on TikTok this past week by new midfielder Korbin Albert. “Wake TF up,” Rapinoe wrote in part in an Instagram story on her personal account, addressing the note to “the people who want to hide behind ‘my beliefs’” and saying that “all you believe in is hate.” Advertisement When asked for comment by The Athletic, Rapinoe said the post was in response to Albert’s social media activity but str…

The men’s national team has won its third straight CONCACAF Nations League final with a 2-0 win over at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Tex. opened the scoring just before halftime with a long-range thunderbolt on his first start for the U.S. in about a year and a half, while Gio Reyna added the United States’ second after providing two assists in the semifinal vs. . Here are our takeaways from the match. The chant persists As the match approached the 90th minute with the United States leading 2-0,…

The U.S. men’s under-23 national team was drawn into Group A in the 2024 , where it will face the host nation , New Zealand and the winner of an intercontinental playoff between a team from the Asian Football Confederation and Guinea in the group stage. The draw offers the U.S. a marquee occasion with a place in the opening game of the tournament, where it will meet a familiar face on the sideline. Legendary striker Thierry Henry, who played and coached in after a successful European career, wi…

With the NWSL season underway and the number of days until the Olympics growing smaller, it’s time to start thinking about what the USWNT roster may look like for the first tournament under incoming head coach Emma Hayes. The three of us went off to independently pick our 18-player roster as things stand now, in mid-March. When we reconvened to compare notes, it turned out we had all selected the exact same 18 players. It feels like a sign. Advertisement It wouldn’t make for terribly compelling…

By Tom Bogert, Pablo Maurer, Jeff Rueter and Paul Tenorio ’s positioning as the , and men’s World Cup all arrive in the U.S. was a theme this week as The Athletic sat down with league commissioner Don Garber and other executives at MLS headquarters in New York City. Advertisement The conversation often turned toward MLS’s evolving place in global soccer, and how it planned to capitalize on the flow of big events and money set to come into the sport in North America over the next three-plus year…

will once again use replacement officials for matches this weekend amidst an ongoing labor dispute between the Professional Soccer Referees Association (PSRA) — the labor union that represents its referees — and the Professional Referee Organization (PRO), the MLS-funded body which administers professional officiating in North America. Advertisement On Tuesday, MLS commissioner Don Garber addressed the ongoing labor dispute in a roundtable with The Athletic, stating in no uncertain terms that th…

For ten months, Major League Soccer has been publicly opining about the state of the U.S. Open Cup, the 110-year-old single-elimination tournament operated by the U.S. Soccer Federation that involves teams from all levels of U.S. Soccer. This month, a resolution was finally reached: MLs will enter just eight of its 26 eligible teams in the tournament, while most other franchises would enter their teams from MLS Next Pro – the league’s development circuit. In a wide-ranging roundtable with The At…

At , Eric Ramsay is making history as the youngest permanent head coach in history. The 32-year-old has never been at the helm of a first team before, having most recently been an assistant under Erik ten Hag at Manchester United. It’s abundantly clear, however, that he feels as ready as he will ever be to take this job. “I think I’ve had enough breadth of experience and now enough depth of experience,” Ramsay told The Athletic. “I’ve spent enough time at the top level to know how players respo…

Should USMNT call up a winger to stop him from representing Italy, Canada or Nigeria? How much should the be a factor in who Gregg Berhalter picks for the ? Does deserve a call-up after his impressive season at Genk? The Copa America is just 100 days away, so six of our writers have done the hard work for Berhalter and chosen the 23 players they would pick for this summer’s tournament on home soil… How to follow the Copa America on The Athletic… Paul Tenorio’s USMNT squad for Copa America My…

By Meg Linehan, Steph Yang, Jeff Rueter and Tamerra Griffin A dramatic penalty shootout featuring three saves and a made spot kick by Alyssa Naeher decided a wet and dramatic CONCACAF W Gold Cup semifinal between the United States and Canada, sending the U.S. into the final after the game had finished 2-2 after extra time. But beyond the late drama and Naeher’s performance in penalties, the main story of Thursday’s win for the — and Canada’s loss — was the state of the field at Snapdragon Stadi…

sent memos to TV and radio broadcasters this weekend not to “belabor the point” when addressing the lockout between the Professional Soccer Referees Association (PSRA) and Professional Referee Organization (PRO), according to a memo obtained by The Athletic and verified by multiple sources familiar with MLS broadcast operations. Advertisement “Fans tune in to watch and listen to the game,” the memo read in part. “They aren’t focused on the officials; therefore, we don’t believe it is necessary t…

U.S. Soccer and made it official on Friday that eight of MLS’s 26 eligible teams will take part in the 2024 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. The federation and the league announced jointly that this year’s edition of the single-elimination tournament will also include 11 MLS Next Pro teams (including nine MLS reserve teams and two independent clubs), and full participation by lower divisions within the United Soccer Leagues (USL) and National Independent Soccer Association (NISA). Advertisement Eight…

The Athletic has obtained the list of referee assignments for this weekend’s games, which includes officials with widely varying degrees of experience. While some have been involved extensively in matches in the second and third divisions of the U.S. Soccer pyramid, others are making the leap from the uppermost levels of youth soccer. Some of the assistant referees have largely worked college games. MLS has been forced to play games with replacement officials after the Professional Referees Org…

By Steph Yang, Meg Linehan and Jeff Rueter U.S. Soccer has approved Division I sanctioning for the USL Super League, which is slated to begin play in August for the 2024-25 season, the governing body announced Friday after a vote at its Annual General Meeting. USL Super League would be a professional league, as opposed to leagues like WPSL, UWS and USL’s W League, which carry amateur players on their rosters. Advertisement “This is a tremendous moment for the USL Super League and for women’s spo…

U.S. Soccer is continuing to discuss ways in which will participate in the 2024 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, sources briefed on the talks told The Athletic. Sources were granted anonymity due to the ongoing discussions at this week’s U.S. Soccer Annual General Meeting in Dallas. In December, MLS announced its intention to replace its teams with teams from its reserve/developmental league, MLS Next Pro, in the U.S. Open Cup, the United States’ single-elimination cup competition that involves teams…

At every turn, takes cues from two camps. The first is following the customs of world soccer: transfer windows over trade deadlines, youth academies providing more sustained upside than college drafts, and some admittedly dull team branding. The second is that of American sports: salary caps over free spending, a league of 30 franchises instead of a 20-team cap, a lack of promotion and relegation between competitive rungs. So often when we talk about how MLS can evolve, it’s skewed heavily in f…

The Gavin Wilkinson era is over at , an eight-day period that sparked fan backlash like few hires have elicited. On Friday, club principal owner Michael Illig announced that the club had “mutually agreed with Gavin Wilkinson to release him from his.” Wilkinson’s hire was met with criticism by the team’s fan base following his tenure as general manager and president of the Portland Timbers and Thorns. Portland following separate investigations into the organizations’ handling of player or coach…

I have covered Minnesota United since 2015, and as any journalist who covers a team can tell you, one steadfast ritual is being asked what that organization will do in the offseason. This winter, everyone — from industry professionals hoping to know what profile of players to pitch new leadership to my grandfather at family Christmas — is asking what the plan is for Minnesota. My answer today is the same as it has been all offseason: there does not appear to be a plan. There’s little evidence to…

I’m too stressed for anything quippy here. I’m Emily Olsen here with Meg Linehan and Steph Yang — welcome to Full Time! This is the digital version of Full Time. If you want it earlier, start every week with Full Time delivered to your inbox.. More Knee Injuries Sam Kerr has . Advertisement This isn’t how I wanted to start the newsletter. I wanted to begin by talking about , the and . I will get to all of that, but first I have to address another ACL injury in women’s sports. Just this morning,…