USMNT World Cup squads ranked, from 1990 to 2026
The United States has one of the most fascinating World Cup histories in international football. They missed 40 years of tournaments after their run to the semifinals in 1930. When they finally returned to Italy in 1990, they lost every game and finished last.
Most countries would have treated that as an embarrassment. American soccer treated it as a starting point. What followed was one of the most unusual development arcs in the sport.
The U. S. hosted the 1994 World Cup, reached the round of 16, and suddenly the country was paying attention.
They went to a quarter-final in 2002, which nobody outside the squad saw coming. They beat the world’s number one team at the 2009 Confederations Cup. Landon Donovan scored one of the great last-minute goals in World Cup history in 2010.
Then came the talent drought, the 2018 qualification disaster, and years of wondering whether the golden generation everyone kept talking about would ever actually show up. MORE: How the last 10 FIFA World Cup hosts performed It showed up. Christian Pulisic, Weston McKennie, Tyler Adams, Yunus Musah, Gio Reyna, Folarin Balogun, Ricardo Pepi, Johnny Cardoso.
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