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  • The USMNT Avenger Assemble in Texas 🇺🇸🇪🇨

The USMNT Avenger Assemble in Texas 🇺🇸🇪🇨

Plus, Rog sits down with Adams & Pulisic.

October 10, 2025

Hail GFOP!

I type with fingers eager for this U.S. team to make us believe, “Soccer’s Coming Home.” Our U.S. boys Avenger Assemble tonight. I have chosen to attack the day with the spirit of radical optimism that has not emanated from this team since…well, World Cup 2014. More on them below, as we gird our loins to face a very tasty Ecuador side this evening. I can’t wait to break down the action with my friend Clint Dempsey after the final whistle. 

And: Prepare for tonight’s rumble with our breakdown of all you need to know. 🇺🇸

I will be honest though: I am jonesing for the Premier League. This international break comes at the most teasing of times. Arsenal in their first-placed Promised Land! Liverpool slumping all the way to checks notes second place. Manchester United calling it a comeback? Tottenham a clenched fist of glory! Manchester City relying on the potency of two giants to stay stealthily in touch. Beautiful Everton Grealishing their way to joy. Each storyline is a powerful hero’s journey. Put them all together and we have enough sprawling human material to fill a Paul Thomas Anderson movie in its entirety. We are blessed, and I ache for next weekend’s fix. Here’s Rory and me breaking down all that madness. 📺

If you are missing the league as badly as I am, just watch Iliman Ndiaye train on his own at home and feel alive. 💙

ii. The highlight of my week was time spent with my friend Tyler Adams, poised to become a father for a second time. While we will miss him terribly on the field, to have the chance to chat about life and football was really poignant in this moment. I first met Tyler when he was 17, to watch him soar with fourth-placed Bournemouth, in the most consistent form of his career, and laugh about what it is like to mark 6-foot-6-inch Nick Woltemade is the stuff of life. You can watch it here. 🍒

iii. Talking about the form of his life, I also spent time with Christian Pulisic, who admitted his sizzling start to the season is the best he has ever felt on a football field for an extended period. This conversation comes out on Monday and was really uplifting. To listen to Christian talk about what goes through his mind when he receives the ball, and the freedom he has been given tactically in Milan is a key to understanding how we need to get the most out of him in a U.S. jersey. 📈

PS – Chris Richards is a human gem. Spend any time around him and you will quickly learn—this beautiful moment is just who he is. 🦅

iv. I am headed off to Madrid to speak at the World Football Summit in Madrid on Wednesday. If any of you are going to be there, come and hear us at 12 p.m. CEST. Vamos! 🇪🇸

PS – Every young footballer should watch the magical Adam Wharton warm-up and look and learn from his sublime craft. I have watched this a million times… 🦈

v. Finally, during tonight’s game, come be with us in that singularly joyful and friend-filled digital pub experience that we call the Men in Blazers Discord. I’ll be in there, reacting in real time to a 90 minutes that hopefully produces a lot of good and not much bad… ah, to dream. There’s absolutely no better place to watch along with your fellow football-obsessed. Join us here. 🍻

Courage,
ROG

MiB HQ Bulletin Board 📣

Catch The Give N Go on VAMOS, our new Hispanic-American content hub covering CONCACAF and much, much more.

To the Football 🍻

USA vs. Ecuador (TONIGHT, 8:30 p.m. ET, TNT) 🇺🇸 🇪🇨

Brace yourself, this is going to be some stern test. Ecuador are the footballing equivalent of one of the 12 Labors of Hercules. Fresh off beating Argentina and finishing second in CONMEBOL qualifying, tonight will rank somewhere between slaying the nine-headed Lernaean Hydra and Capturing the Erymanthian Boar. Yes, La Tri will be without Chelsea’s ultimate fighter Moisés Caicedo and Arsenal defender Piero Hincapié, but this team is fast, furious and physical. Mauricio Pochettino has asked us to trust his process. Tonight should be a true test of our progress, identity and collective belief. Here are the questions I am looking forward to seeing real answers to… 

i. Can We Set Up Christian Pulisic to Hurt Opponents in a U.S. Jersey as He Has Done for Milan? 

Christian Pulisic has been in the form of his life for Milan with a league-leading four goals and two assists. When we spoke this week, he identified the source of his potency: the tactical freedom he’s been given by coach Max Allegri, which reminded me of what Jack Grealish said in this incredible clip about how he plays at his best. Pochettino still must crack the code within his system to set Christian up to do similarly in a U.S. lineup. He has too often cut a frustrated figure, but if we can create the freedom for Pulisic to acquire possession in space to hurt opponents with a striker running ahead of him, we can soar. 

ii. To That End, Do We Play Three or Four at the Back?

In our last-game victory against a Japan XI, Poch moved Christian to play under the striker in a 3-4-2-1 lineup, and CP linked up with Balogun for his goal with a flourish. I believe it will be three at the back again. Our nation’s great tactical experiment must continue.

iii. Can Weston McKennie Assert Himself and Win a Place in Poch’s Good Book? 

There is the Weston McKennie of our dreams: the Texan bowling ball capable of knocking down all-comers. There is also the McKennie of this cycle—a capricious player whom Poch does not trust to fit into the hard-grind, all-in, always-on culture he expects and demands. 

It has incredibly been seven long months since Weston was last in a U.S. national team camp—since the darkness of the Nations League slumping defeats to Panama and Canada. In that spell, he somehow managed to both captain Juventus at the Club World Cup, lose his place in the team, then fight his way back in. At club level, Weston has consistently proved he is never more focussed and effective than when he is on the brink of exile—a truth which is a reflection of his mentality, rather than his potential skill, which is not in doubt. Can he do the same again for us tonight? 

iv. How Long Can Antonee Robinson Go?

That electric left-back/footballing can opener Antonee Robinson is back in the squad for the first time in almost a year. The Fulham star is returning from a long-term knee injury and is yet to start a Premier League game this season. He will be on a severe time restraint, yet the U.S. are truly only a three-dimensional team when he is flying down the flank. 

Also, who is on the right? Twenty-one-year-old Orlando City speed freak Alex Freeman is the only natural right-back… Does he play or does Tim Weah play wingback?

v. Who's Up Top: Flo Balogun or Haji Wright? 

I hope Haji gets some playing time, gent has been the man for Frank Lampard’s unbeaten Coventry. Here is Herc Gomez explaining what has changed for the Los Angeles striker whose confidence has gone next level. 

vi. Who's in Goal?

Harvard Donnarumma Matt Freese is the heir apparent. Matt Turner is back in the squad. Freese has the form, Matty T. the experience. Can we play them both at the same time? 

vii. Where Are We Between Experiment and Reality? 

This is one strange cycle. The steady diet of friendlies has offered Poch the chance to experiment and audition with no consequences. He has asked us to trust his process without truly articulating what that is. I asked both Tyler Adams and Christian Pulisic what matters in these games. As highly competitive athletes, they both had the same answer: winning and the results. At what stage will the open auditions and tactical experiments cohere? The World Cup is 244 days away. There are just a handful of games left before we play before the teams, who as in the Ryder Cup, are all going to want to do us. Close by, the train is waiting…

PS – Really lovely piece on the incredibly inspiring Diego Luna.

Score Tickets to FIFA World Cup 26™ w/ Verizon

FIFA World Cup 26™ starts in just 244 days and this is your chance to experience it in all its North American glory, thanks to our friends at Verizon. They’ve teamed up with David Beckham and an all-star roster of talent to launch Verizon Ultimate Access for FIFA World Cup 26™. Verizon customers will have access to thousands of free FIFA World Cup 26™ tickets, once-in-a-lifetime opportunities to win “Golden Tickets” for access on the field during game play, meet and greets and more on the road to the tournament. Come make football memories that will last a lifetime.

Even More Football ⚽️

The Correspondent with Rory Smith: On Ange’s Demons 🇦🇺

Rory writes: Perhaps, in time, we will come to realize that Ange Postecoglou’s fatal flaw was believing in himself too much. It is exactly a month since the Australian agreed to take charge at Nottingham Forest, and yet there is already an inescapable sense that the curtain is falling. In public, some sections of the club’s fanbase have already called for change. In private, prospective replacements are starting to maneuver. When it ends, how it ends remains unclear. That it will, and soon, seems inevitable.

Results, needless to say, have not been great. Postecoglou has overseen seven games since succeeding Nuno Espírito Santo. He has won none of them. He has only drawn two: a creditable point away at Real Betis in the Europa League, and a less creditable one at newly-promoted Burnley in the Premier League. There was a humiliating defeat in the Carabao Cup, and a bitterly disappointing one in the club’s first home game in Europe for a generation. Forest’s squad is very obviously too deep, too good to be worrying about relegation. Forest’s form, and its position in the nascent Premier League table, say otherwise.

It was not exactly difficult to see this coming. It is hard to think of two more diametrically-opposed managers than Postecoglou, an attacking ideologue, and Nuno, an unapologetic counter-puncher. Quite why Evangelos Marinakis, Forest’s bombastic owner, thought swapping one for the other with the season already underway was a good idea is anyone’s guess. 

Beautiful Football Around the World 🌎

Germany vs. Luxembourg (TODAY, 2:45 p.m. ET, Fox Soccer Plus) 🇩🇪🇱🇺

Germany find themselves three out of four in Group A of UEFA’s World Cup qualifiers, so under-pressure manager Julian Nagelsmann must quickly cohere his team together and use bottom-placed Luxembourg as a launch pad. The Germans went winless for four matches earlier this year and were stodgy in their 3-1 comeback victory against Northern Ireland in the last round of qualifiers, but that’s not changed the manager’s mind on Leroy Sane and Manuel Neuer, both of whom continue to miss out. Neuer and Nagelsmann have historic beef that stretches back to their time together at Bayern, but if the Gallagher brothers can complete a world tour without destroying each other, don’t rule out seeing Neuer at the World Cup next year.

Spain vs. Georgia (Saturday, 2:45 p.m. ET, Fox Soccer Plus) 🇪🇸🇬🇪

European champions Spain started World Cup qualification by scoring nine and conceding zero goals in two games, meaning victories against Georgia tomorrow and Bulgaria on Tuesday would guarantee their invitation to the party in the USA next year. Past and future Ballon d’Or winners, Rodri and Lamine Yamal, both pulled out of Luis de la Fuente’s squad due to injury, and the awkward war between Barcelona and Spain over the teenage winger could inspire prose from Hemingway. Georgia will joust with Turkey for second in Group E, led by lynchpin PSG winger Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, a man who can steal the soul of any defender in world football.

Portugal vs. Republic of Ireland (Saturday, 2:45 p.m. ET, fuboTV) 🇵🇹🇮🇪

Everything’s coming up Roberto Martínez, the manager whose Portugal side are 2025 UEFA Nations League Champions and two-in-two at the top of Group F in World Cup qualifying. He’s also found a way to use football’s first billionaire, 40-year-old Cristiano Ronaldo, a man who’s expected to start tomorrow and who most of his teammates first played with on Xbox as teenagers. Republic of Ireland are bottom of the group with a point and Josh Cullen, Will Smallbone and Jack Taylor have the unenviable task of going head-to-head with a fantasy midfield of Bruno Fernandes, Vitinha and Bernado Silva tomorrow. 

Netherlands vs. Finland (Sunday, 12 p.m. ET, fuboTV) 🇳🇱🇫🇮

Ronald Koeman’s Netherlands are top of Group G by three points and World Cup qualification should be a stroll given their decadent midfield of Ryan Gravenberch, Frenkie de Jong and Tijjani Reijnders, as well as a factory line of center-backs that makes Koeman’s “head hurt.” Rapper, philanthropist and goal addict Clint Dempsey Memphis Depay became his country’s all-time top-scorer in the last round of qualifiers, adding another yesterday in a 4-0 win against Malta to take him to 53 in 105 games. Finland are FIFA’s 71st-ranked team and beat Lithuania 2-1 last night to hold the third spot in the group, but are level on points with Poland in second. 

NWSL Playoff Race 🇺🇸

Five teams can clinch a playoff berth this weekend while Utah, Angel City, and Houston fight to stay in the race for the postseason. Only Gotham has their playoff future in their own hands, as a win against Kansas City would guarantee their spot (Saturday, 5 p.m. ET, ion), while Portland, Seattle, Orlando and Louisville need other results to go their way to secure qualification. 

WSL Everton vs. Man Utd (Sunday, 7 a.m. ET, ESPN/WSL Youtube) 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

Three of the WSL’s 12 teams (that’s 25% for all you math heads out there) played midweek in the Champions League. Struggling Everton will hope Man Utd are still feeling the effects of their 1-0 win against Norwegian side Vålerenga as they host for the first time at Hill Dickinson Stadium.

Countdown to the FIFA World Cup 26™ with the Buchamión in Dallas

🚌The Buchanan's Whisky Buchamión is continuing its journey and stopping in Dallas this Saturday, Oct. 11 at Texas Live! to celebrate the countdown to the FIFA World Cup 26™ for a VIP celebration including a watch party and after party!

⚽ Countdown Celebration Details ⚽

Join us to watch the Mexico vs. Colombia friendly match in the lead up to FIFA World Cup 26™ and stick around for the after party with beats from DJ Avii Glow, signature Buchanita cocktails, giveaways and the opportunity to submit your entry to the Goal Celebration Dance Contest (must be 25+) for a chance to win tickets to the FIFA World Cup 26™!

RSVP: HERE | This event is RSVP-Only for Guests 21+

Location: Arlington Backyard at Texas Live! | 1650 E Randol Mill Rd, Arlington, TX 76011
🎉 6 p.m. | Pre-Game Celebration
⚽ 8 p.m. | Watch Party
🥃 10 p.m. | After Party

¡Nos Vamos al Mundial!

SIP RESPONSIBLY. 21+ only. BUCHANAN'S Blended Scotch Whisky. 40% Alc/Nol. Imported by Diageo, New York, NY.

MiB Mad Libs 📝

This week’s phrase is: “Poch should build the USMNT around ___ and World Cup glory will be guaranteed.”

Email us your submissions to be in contention to win a coveted MiB patch.

There were some magnificent submissions this week, but there can only be one winner:

Jess McHargue: I watch the international break with two eyes closed because I am still convincing my wife that World Cup tickets will be money well spent. 🇺🇸

Introducing Pet FC’s Newest Member: Sadio 🐶

We have partnered with the two-legged people at Purina to create Pet FC, a new initiative where we will be featuring YOUR four-legged friends that show a true love of football on par with their human counterparts.

The Chihuahua mix and his two brothers are named after Liverpool's Champions League-winning front three: Sadio Mané, Bobby Firmino and Mo Salah. A proper Red through and through, Sadio loves tagging along for matches with the local LFC supporters group. ❤️

Do you have a great football story involving the dog or cat in your life? Click the link below to submit your pets and pet stories, and we will be regularly featuring the best of the best here in the Raven and on our social channels. What's more, we have Purina prize packs for every pet featured.

Not Football and All the Better for It 📖

A GFOP Writes… ✍️

Last week, the magical Emily Machesney wrote about the heartbreak in Atlanta animal shelters which were overrun with dogs, nearly a 100 of whom would be put down within 24 hours because of lack of space. One of the dogs was named Big Ange, another was Ronaldo. I was so heartened to receive this follow-up message from Emily on Tuesday: 

“Rog, just wanted to update you that somehow, by some miracle ALL 99 dogs were adopted or fostered!! Thank you for helping to spread the word! The doggy miracle certainly took the sting out of Brighton dropping points to Wolves.” 

Rog writes: You readers are THE BEST! This message made my week. Despite all the chaos in the world, it is the glimpses of good that make my heart surge. Atlanta, you are so inspiring. Let’s all try and put more love out into the world. And, whomever adopted Ronaldo and Big Ange, email me, and I will send you some dog food, as promised. 

Keep sending your stories and questions to [email protected].

To Better Days Ahead for All.

Let’s not take a moment watching football together for granted and make great memories.

Big Love.

Courage,
ROG

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