TAMPA, FL. – Borrowing a line from Bill Hader Saturday Night Live character Stefon, the US men's team had a good year All – routine victories, boring defeats, fresh faces and a new tactical vision. Even if USMNT spectators have been trained to expect the unexpected, their 2025 finals game gave the masses something completely new – Defeat Uruguay with a score of 5:1.featuring a rotating squad full of excellent players aiming to secure a place in the World Cup squad.
The match started as normal, and then it seemed like everyone was scoring goals at once. Sebastian Berhalter put the USMNT ahead in the 17th minute with an impressive strike, but by the time Alex Freeman scored a brace in the 31st minute, they had already formed a habit. The USA essentially scored when they wanted, while Uruguay's defense collapsed time and time again. Freeman's second goal was perhaps the prime example: the Orlando City defender torched Barcelona centre-back Ronald Araujo, perfectly capturing the atmosphere of the evening.
Diego Luna scored a goal of his own before half-time and, even on a difficult night for Uruguay, produced a brilliant moment with Georgian de Arrasqueta's bicycle kick. A quieter start to the second half did not mean the eventful part of the evening was over, with Rodrigo Bentancur's second yellow card in the 65th minute and Tanner Tessman's strike four minutes later keeping the party going, another fireworks display on a night full of them. Raymond James Stadium was far from full, but it was time well spent for all in attendance. That was especially true for an unfamiliar version of the USMNT, which recorded its first clear win since head coach Mauricio Pochettino took over as head coach just over a year ago.
Pochettino said on Monday that he will change his teamThat partly explains the quick turnaround from Saturday's 2-1 win over Paraguay, but it is rare that a head coach embraces the spirit of experimentation as wholeheartedly as he did on Tuesday. He made nine changes to his starting line-up, which consisted almost entirely of players who needed to prepare for the World Cup. These players wasted little time on this – Freeman had already been on track for a spot in the World Cup squad for months – but stood by his arguments, as did Luna.
Luna and Freeman are perhaps the shining examples of Pochettino's experience – neither were on the USMNT's radar before the head coach's arrival but continue to earn squad calls and minutes on the pitch. Luna ends 2025 as the team's leader, and Freeman has emerged as the surprise star of the show in his home state, a classic example of why the head coach has called in fresh faces to shake things up.
“It’s our job, our duty, to see the player’s projection and to do that we need to give him a chance and see how he performs, how he acts, his character, his mentality,” Pochettino said of Freeman after the match. “[At] At some point it means recognizing some talent, but at the same time it means being brave and giving the opportunity to play. … For me, this is not our merit. We [only] give him a platform to show quality, but the credit goes to [for] to him.
“But I’m so happy, so glad that he scored twice,” Pochettino continued. “We need to analyze how he plays – he can play as a third central defender, he can play forward on the side, come into the middle. The moment he takes the ball, how difficult is it for the opponent to stop him, get into the middle and play. When he has the ball, the team is like that – it’s like a substitution. It’s so easy.” [he] plays.”
Freeman and Luna's teammates followed suit Tuesday, rising to the occasion in more ways than one. It was a banner night for Berhalter, who had a goal and an assist by the 20th minute. The Vancouver Whitecaps player got into a heated conversation in midfield, pestering Uruguay to the point that Bentancur was sent off for injuring his ankle. He has been a stand-in in midfield alongside Aidan Morris, the pair holding down the defense admirably while veterans such as Tyler Adams and Weston McKennie missed camp this month for various reasons.
“We know we have what it takes to perform like this, but I think it comes down to the DNA and the mentality that goes into the games,” Luna said. “That's been the biggest shift and I think finding that and I think no matter what kind of player we have on the field, we have quality. I think you just have to bring that mentality and that hard-working attitude to every game.”
However, these two only scratch the surface of how well Pochettino's insistence on experimentation has gone over, and this is not the first time. Results have been inconsistent in the year since Pochettino took charge, but the one constant has been an unwavering determination to tear things down and start from scratch. Along the way, the team may have looked aimless at times, raising questions about whether Pochettino had thrown the goal too wide and sacrificed chemistry during his truncated World Cup preparations. Next summer's tournament may still be seven months away, but Pochettino may be in a better position than ever to take a victory lap. His team is undoubtedly unfamiliar with the one lost to Uruguay with a score of 1:0. in the last game of Gregg Berhalter's time in charge of the team, he improved due to almost all the changes he made.
“We never doubted because we saw the quality of the players,” Pochettino said. “[It] it was only to trust them and give them the opportunity to find a way to act, to behave the way we feel that [it] it means being a professional.”
Now riding a three-game winning streak and unbeaten in their last five matches, the USMNT continues to find different ways to pull out victories. Saturday's tough performance against Paraguay gave way to remarkable success on Tuesday from set pieces. Pochettino's side scored four of their five goals during these chances, with the special skills of several players coming to the fore. Berhalter was a bright spot at dead ball during the Concacaf Gold Cup and excelled again against Uruguay as a left winger John Tolkien remembers his legacy with the New York Red Bulls and fired into the corner for Freeman's first goal.
“I feel like we’re working on it,” Freeman said. “It's a chance to score, so I think it's just an opportunity for us to know that it's a scoring opportunity and we have to be 100 percent in it. We can't half-ass the set-piece or be half-hearted. We want to be 100 percent in it… It's really good for us to be able to score like that.”
The performance, both collective and individual, presents a good set of challenges for Pochettino, with just one international break remaining before his World Cup squad is finalized. This may have led to an unpredictable race to the finish, which is exactly what Pochettino had hoped for all along.
“To be honest, it's very difficult for Pochettino to know that a lot of these guys come in and have a big impact on the team,” Freeman said. “They're going to come in and give 100 percent and… [try] to turn heads which one to choose. I think it just gives our pool the opportunity to prove itself to different people and I feel like it just makes us a good nation to play in because you know other people are going to give 100 percent and we have so many talented players in the pool so it's about trying to pick the best and come in 100 percent and be able to perform and I think that just brings good training and good international breaks.”
