Christian Pulisic may be the perfect 10 for aging U.S. national team
There are few gestures in sports that sag more heavily under the weight of tradition and expectation than pulling on the No. 10 jersey in soccer.
That’s the number reserved for a team’s most creative and effective playmaker. It’s the one Pele, Diego Maradona and Ronaldinho wore. It’s the one Lionel Messi, Wayne Rooney, Carli Lloyd and Marta still wear.
And on Friday, ahead of a World Cup qualifier with St. Vincent and the Grenadines, it was the number 17-year-old Christian Pulisic pulled on for the first time with the U.S. senior national team.
“The No. 10 has a meaning,” U.S. Coach Juergen Klinsmann said. “Ask him now how he feels with that heavy number on his back.”
He felt pretty good, actually, scoring twice and assisting on a third goal in just 26 minutes of a 6-0 win that left the U.S. all but assured a place in the final stage of regional World Cup qualifying.
The Americans need a win or draw Tuesday against Trinidad and Tobago in Jacksonville, Fla., to guarantee a spot in the six-team hexagonal round, which will determine the three CONCACAF teams that will play in Russia in 2018. But even a loss is unlikely to eliminate the U.S., since it holds a huge advantage in goal differential over Guatemala, the only team that can catch it in the group standings.
And Pulisic deserves to start that game for reasons that go beyond his performance in St. Vincent, where he became the youngest American male to score in a World Cup qualifier and the youngest with two goals in international play.
Pulisic deserves to start because he’s part of U.S. Soccer’s future, one Juergen Klinsmann’s aging team must transition to now if the coach hopes to make good on his goal of reaching the semifinals in Russia.
Eight of the 13 players the U.S. used in the third-place game of June’s Copa America will be at least 31 by the next World Cup, among them Clint Dempsey, who will be 35, Jermaine Jones, 36, and Tim Howard who, at 39 leads a shallow pool of aging goalkeepers in desperate need of rejuvenation.
In the lineup Klinsmann used Friday, five of the 14 players were 23 or younger while three others on the bench won’t turn 22 before next year. And that doesn’t include Galaxy midfielder Gyasi Zardes, 25, who is sidelined with a broken foot, or 23-year-old defender John Brooks, who is out with a back injury.
It’s a youthful group of 10 – there’s that number again – that includes forwards Bobby Wood and Jordan Morris, midfielders Zardes and Pulisic and defenders DeAndre Yedlin and Kellyn Acosta. They figure to form the core of the team for Russia.
So perhaps there was something other than symbolism involved in giving Pulisic the No. 10 jersey, which has been more an albatross than an accolade since Klinsmann ripped it off Landon Donovan’s back a month before the last World Cup.
The coach gave it first to Mix Diskerud, who didn’t play a minute in Brazil. Then earlier this summer he gave it to Darlington Nagbe. But it didn’t fit him either with Nagbe seeing less than 50 minutes of action off the bench in the Copa America, finishing the tournament without a goal or assist.
So Klinsmann let equipment manager Jesse Bignami hand out the numbers this month. And Bignami scored a perfect 10.
“Obviously it’s an honor,” said Pulisic, who in seven appearances as a substitute with the U.S. has shown a level of skill, savvy and intelligence that make it easy to forget he’s still a teenager. “Some great number 10s have been out there. I was just given the number, so I’m excited to wear it.”
And he should wear it as a starter, because if Klinsmann doesn’t embrace the future now, in two years he’ll need all the fingers on both hands to count his regrets.
Follow Kevin Baxter on Twitter @kbaxter11
