IRVINE, Calif. — Weston McKennie has taken up a new habit at the U.S. men’s national team’s World Cup base.
The team’s setup for media availabilities has two players talking behind, essentially, bleachers.
So McKennie, the team’s resident pot-stirrer, has started to stand on the bleachers while his teammates give interviews, messing around at will.
“Good guy, kind of a clown,” Max Arfsten said last week, with McKennie looking on. “That’s all I can say, really.”
That’s typical McKennie.
He sits next to Folarin Balogun on the plane and flicks his ear to keep him awake.
He doesn’t have much interest in watching other soccer games, not wanting the sport to consume his whole life.
He’s also one of the most crucial pieces of Mauricio Pochettino’s side, the only player to start all three group-stage games and in the midst of an excellent World Cup.
Given McKennie’s versatility — at various points this season, he lined up at practically every spot on the field for Juventus — there was some debate heading into the competition over how deep he should play.
Especially after Pochettino selected a squad with seemingly little depth at defensive midfield, dropping him into a deeper role where he’d partner with Tyler Adams seemed likely.
McKennie’s best position, though, and preferred spot, is attacking midfield.
Pochettino stuck to that, putting Malik Tillman next to Adams instead to help create a midfield “pentagon,” in the words of Paraguay coach Gustavo Alfaro, that’s vexed the opposition.
“I think he’s really important for us,” Sergiño Dest said Sunday as the USMNT returned to full training ahead of its round of 32 match against Bosnia-Herzegovina. “He’s kind of a box-to-box player. He runs a lot, he helps a lot, he goes into every duel with full effort. That’s really helpful for the team, because we need balance. We have a lot of different types of players and he’s just a really important one.”
McKennie, indeed, has been a huge reason behind the success of Pochettino’s system.
His combination play with Dest was a constant throughout the win over Australia, his passing terrific against Paraguay.
It seemed excessive to play him 86 minutes against Turkey in a meaningless match, but there doesn’t seem to have been any negative outcome from it, and McKennie, again, was in the center of things on both ends of the pitch.
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Truth be told, he’s unlucky to have come out of the group stage without a goal or assist.
Along with Pulisic and Adams, he’s also one of the faces of the program’s post-2017 resurgence, having gotten his first cap against Portugal in the first game the USMNT played after failing to qualify for the 2018 World Cup.
That does give him something of a leadership role in the squad, albeit in unorthodox fashion.
When the program wanted to wine and dine Balogun during its push to get him to commit in 2023, for example, McKennie was one of the players at the dinner.
“I think Weston has really matured,” Balogun said. “I think this is his best club season as well, and he’s brought that form into the international level. I’m very, very proud of Weston and the strides he’s made. He’s definitely turned into more of a senior and leader within our team.
“He continues to lead in different ways. He’s somebody who makes the energy good within camp, who talks to everyone, makes sure everyone’s comfortable. And on the pitch, you can see within the game we’ve played, he has a real impact. I hope, like Malik, he can continue this not just here, but carry it into the following seasons.”
— Additional reporting by Mark Cannizzaro