Predicting the USMNT’s starting lineup at the World Cup: What previous tournaments tell us

I’m old. In fact, I’m old enough to remember when the U.S. men’s national team crashed out against Mexico in the Gold Cup final without much of a fight.

I’m old enough to remember when, earlier in that same tournament, a succession of wins from a mostly MLS-based roster had some commentators wondering whether these players just wanted it more than their fancy teammates over in the Champions League. I’m old enough to remember when those same players got annihilated by Turkey and Switzerland just a few weeks earlier.

I’m old enough to remember when every former U.S. member with a podcast melted down because a handful of Europe-based players declined a call-up for the Gold Cup. I’m old enough to remember when, a couple months before that, the fan base melted down after the U.S. was eliminated by Panama in the Nations League after winning three straight Nations Leagues under the previous managerial regime.

And I’m old enough to remember when the majority of those U.S. fans rejoiced when the program replaced Gregg Berhalter with a proven world-class coach like Mauricio Pochettino.

All of that happened … within the past year and a half. As did this week’s 5-1 win over Uruguay, which was powered by absolutely ridiculous finishing, fortuitous bounces and some poor goalkeeping:

With seven months until the World Cup, it might not seem like there’s much time left. But the U.S. fan base has lived multiple lifetimes over the past 18 months.

From now until the summer, someone is going to get injured, someone is going to emerge out of nowhere, someone is going to stop playing for his club team, and the U.S. will either win or lose games that don’t reflect the true quality of the team. A lot is still going to happen.

In order to look forward — and stay safe from the results-based whiplash — we can actually look backward. What can the previous three World Cup cycles tell us about who might be on the field when the U.S. kicks things off at SoFi Stadium on June 12, 2026?

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Who starts World Cups for the USMNT?

Let’s start in 2010.

In the Americans’ opening match against England, they had Tim Howard in goal. At the back: Steve Cherundolo at right back, Jay Demerit and Oguchi Onyewu in the center and Carlos Bocanegra bumped out to the left. At the base of midfield was the pair of Michael Bradley and Ricardo Clark, and then ahead of them, as a pair of attacking midfielders, were the two stars: Landon Donovan and Clint Dempsey. And up top, it was Jozy Altidore and Robbie Findley.

Seven of those names were unsurprising: Howard, Onyewu, Bocanegra, Bradley, Donovan, Dempsey and Altidore all played over 1,000 minutes for the U.S. the previous year. Cherundolo wasn’t much of a surprise, either. He’d only played 500-ish minutes the prior year thanks to a number of lower body injuries and the emergence of West Ham’s Jonathan Spector, but he was the captain at Bundesliga club Hannover and he was fully healthy come South Africa.

Both Clark and Demerit played around 500 minutes, too, and they fit into what we’ll call the «potential starter» tier. There weren’t obviously better options than either of them. And then there was the one shocker: Robbie Findley, who played zero minutes for the U.S. in 2009 but emerged after a car accident that seriously injured Charlie Davies opened up a spot for him to play alongside Altidore.

In 2009, Davies played 750 minutes for the U.S., but he was never the same after the accident. Among nonstarters in South Africa, only Jonathan Bornstein played more minutes (900-plus), but he lost his spot once Bob Bradley moved Bocanegra to fullback. And after Davies, the two most-used players in 2009 were Spector and midfielder Benny Feilhaber, who played heavy minutes off the bench in 2010.

So that’s seven obvious starters, one more obvious returnee from injury, two maybes, and one out-of-nowhere.

Let’s move on to 2014.

Howard was in goal again. At the back, it was Fabian Johnson at right back and Damarcus Beasley on the left, with Geoff Cameron and Matt Besler in between. Manager Jurgen Klinsmann opted for a diamond midfield with Kyle Beckerman at the base and three shuttlers (Jermaine Jones, Bradley and Alejandro Bedoya). Up top, Dempsey played behind Altidore.

In 2013, Howard, Beasley and Altidore all played 1,000-plus minutes, while Dempsey, Bradley, Jones, Cameron and Besler all played at least 900. Bedoya clocked in around 820, while Beckerman played 680 and Johnson 580.

That feels similar to the breakdown four years earlier. Howard, Beasley, Altidore, Dempsey, Bradley and Jones were all shoe-ins, while two of Besler, Cameron and Omar González (who played over 1,000 minutes in 2013) were expected to play in the center of the defense. If we say it was all but guaranteed that one of Besler and Cameron would start, then that lands us at seven clear starters once again.

Johnson fills the «Cherundolo role» — he was arguably the most talented player in the pool and he’d just recently filed his one-time switch from Germany to the U.S. And then Bedoya and Beckerman fill the «maybe» quota.

There was no Findley type on the field against Ghana in 2014, but there was, shockingly, no Landon Donovan, who played 800-plus minutes the year before. There was also no Eddie Johnson, who played 900-plus minutes in 2013 and seemed like a potential starter, and no Clarence Goodson, who featured in 880 minutes. The Jurgen Klinsmann era was, um, interesting.

From 2010 to 2014, the U.S. carried over four starters: Howard, Bradley, Dempsey and Altidore. Unfortunately, we can’t trace the lineage to 2018 because the U.S. didn’t qualify. We must fast-forward to 2022.

So, let’s look at 2022 and the lineup for the opening match with Wales.

In goal: Matt Turner. At the back: Sergiño Dest on the right, Antonee Robinson on the left, with Walker Zimmerman and Tim Ream in the center. There was a three-man midfield for the first time: Tyler Adams, Weston McKennie and Yunus Musah. And same goes for the front three: Christian Pulisic on the left, Timothy Weah out right and Josh Sargent in the center.

The year prior, Turner was the only starter to feature in at least 1,000 minutes, which says less about the surprising nature of the lineup and more about the changing state of the player pool. In other words: a lot more guys in Europe, who wouldn’t be on any of the MLS-based rosters. Two other guys broke 700 minutes (Robinson and Adams), while three more went beyond 600 (McKennie, Zimmerman and Dest). Pulisic and Musah both played more than 500 minutes, while Weah, Sargent and Ream were all below it.

I think we can say that Turner, Adams, Robinson, McKennie, Zimmerman and Dest were penciled-in starters at this time in 2021. Pulisic, then, fills the Cherundolo/Johnson role of the guy who starts if he’s healthy. And then I’d say Musah and Weah were «maybe starters,» while Ream and Sargent were both surprises.

In 2021, Miles Robinson, Kellyn Acosta and Sebastian Lletget all played over 1,000 minutes. Robinson would’ve started in Qatar had he not torn an Achilles, while Acosta was sunset into a backup role with the emergence of Musah after the latter’s one-time switch from England.

Lletget was a Berhalter favorite who just couldn’t stack up with the development of the team’s younger talent. Brenden Aaronson also played 800-plus minutes in 2021 but wasn’t starting come the World Cup.

Who will start for the USMNT at the 2026 World Cup?

To bring it all together: There have usually been around seven expected starters at the end of the year before the World Cup, one guy who will start if healthy, and then some combination of maybe-starters and outright surprises.

Across the 33 starters at the previous three World Cups for the U.S., there was one guy who played zero minutes the year before, three who played fewer than 500 minutes, 17 between 500 and 900 minutes, and 11 who played 1,000 minutes or more. On average, keepers played 1,135 minutes the year before the World Cup, and outfielders played 799.

Incredibly, very few of the most talented Americans have even hit 500 minutes this past year. These are the 11 players who broke that threshold:

Matt Freese: 1,170 minutes
Tim Ream: 1,108
Max Arfsten: 1,086
Chris Richards: 1,004
Alex Freeman: 976
Diego Luna: 953
Patrick Agyemang: 806
Malik Tillman: 765
Sebastian Berhalter: 704
Tyler Adams: 697
Luca de la Torre: 545

Some players below 500 minutes: Pulisic, Dest, McKennie, Musah, Weah, Turner, Sargent, Aaronson, Antonee Robinson, Folarin Balogun, Johnny Cardoso, Gio Reyna, Joe Scally, Tanner Tessman and Ricardo Pepi.

Working from the 1,000-plus-minutes list, I think we can pencil in Freese, Ream and Richards all as starters. And I think we need to put Arfsten on the list, too. Pochettino clearly loves him, the switch to a back three helps cover up his matador tendencies out of possession, and the other option, Robinson, still hasn’t started a Premier League game for Fulham this season. He has played only 64 total minutes.

That’s four likely starters, and we need to get to six or seven. It’s really hard to see anyone other than Adams starting in central midfield if he’s healthy.

It’s also clear that Pochettino wants one of the three center backs to be more of a half-fullback-half-center-back — this is what he did at Chelsea — and Alex Freeman played that role and scored two goals (!?) against Uruguay. It’s also worth pointing out, not that I think this data is driving decision-making in any real way, but Freeman already looks like an all-time great MLS fullback, based on the goals-added metric from American Soccer Analysis. He won’t turn 22 until after the World Cup.

Obviously, we can add in Pulisic as our «if he’s healthy, he starts» star. He’s the best player in the pool, he’s the best American player ever and this is the one World Cup they get with him in his prime.

That leaves four more spots: right wing back, the other central midfield slot, the other attacking midfielder next to Pulisic and the striker.

As Matthew Doyle noted for the MLS website, Pochettino has succeeded in expanding the American player pool — or at least expanding our perception of the player pool. That’s interesting, especially in light of recent comments by Canada manager Jesse Marsch, who suggested that managers might be able to rely on a smaller core of players than usual because the expanded World Cup means teams will have more days off between matches. I’m not sure whether Pochettino’s approach is the right or wrong one, but it certainly makes this specific exercise a little trickier.

If he’s healthy, though, Balogun is clearly the best American striker — he gets good shots unlike anyone else in the pool — and he has played more minutes than any attacker since the Gold Cup. So he’s our starting striker.

At right wing back, especially if Freeman is playing as a centerback-ish type, there’s no real option other than Dest. He was injured for a good chunk of this year, so he didn’t play much, but a wingback role also covers up his defensive inadequacies, and like Arfsten, he started the final two games of the year.

Next to Pulisic, there are plenty of options: Luna, Tillman, McKennie, Weah, Reyna, maybe even Aaronson or Alejandro Zendejas. You’ve been asleep for half a decade if you’re willing to confidently predict anything about Reyna’s future, so he’s out.

Although he’s currently injured, Tillman would be my pick. Not, like, my pick if I were the coach, but my pick for who the coach will pick. I’m not confident in this projection, but I think he gets a slight edge simply because he has played way more for Pochettino over the past year.

That leaves us with the last spot: the one next to Adams. Although they’ve played a lot, Sebastian Berhalter and de la Torre really don’t make sense as starters. So it’s between McKennie, Tessman, Musah and Cristian Roldan. Musah hasn’t been called up since before the Gold Cup, so I’m not planting my flag there. McKennie wasn’t called up this window, so he probably should be lower down my list, too.

Reading the tea leaves suggests Roldan because of that one tea leaf that literally quotes Mauricio Pochettino as saying, «Cristian Roldan is maybe an example of if you want to build your perfect player.» But it seems like there is one guy who comes out of nowhere to break into the starting XI every cycle. And given that he has appeared in only four games for the U.S. and didn’t even get called up for the final two games in 2025, McKennie fits that bill.

Now, my predicted lineup is almost definitely going to be incorrect. But with around seven guys who were key pieces this year, one injured star, and three players who have been in and out of the picture, it looks a lot like all of the other USMNT lineups that have started World Cups in recent years.