{"id":8843,"date":"2026-03-28T07:24:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T07:24:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/8843\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T07:24:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T07:24:13","slug":"injuries-rule-out-two-u-s-defenders-adding-another-dimension-to-the-usmnts-test-against-belgium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/8843\/","title":{"rendered":"Injuries rule out two U.S. defenders, adding another dimension to the USMNT\u2019s test against Belgium"},"content":{"rendered":"

News of injuries to Chris Richards and Miles Robinson compounded the concerns over the USMNT\u2019s most suspect sector: the central defense.<\/p>\n

Following the USA\u2019s Friday practice at Atlanta United\u2019s training facility, Coach Maurico Pochettino explained that Richards\u2019 knee pain will sideline him for Saturday\u2019s friendly against Belgium and very likely Tuesday\u2019s clash with Portugal. Robinson suffered a groin injury in practice earlier this week and will miss both games.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re lucky that we brought five center backs,\u201d said Pochettino, who played in Argentina\u2019s central defense at the 2002 World Cup.<\/p>\n

In addition to traditional central defenders Tim Ream, Mark McKenzie and Auston Trusty, Joe Scally and Tanner Tessmann are backline options. Scally usually plays outside back or wide midfielder for Borussia M\u00f6nchengladbach, but has filled in as a central defender, as has Tessmann, primarily a defensive midfielder at Lyon.<\/p>\n

In the USA\u2019s\u00a0 tremendous 5-1 win over Uruguay in its final game of 2025, Pochettino started a back three of Alex Freeman, McKenzie and Trusty.<\/p>\n

In another standout performance of the Pochettino era, a 2-0 win over Japan, Freeman played wing back while the back three consisted of Ream, Richards and Tristan Blackmon, who\u2019s not in camp.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\tSoccer America Executive Editor Mike Woitalla has written freelance articles about soccer for more than 30 media outlets in nine nations. The winner of eight United Soccer Coaches Writing Contest awards,…\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\tMore by Mike Woitalla\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"News of injuries to Chris Richards and Miles Robinson compounded the concerns over the USMNT\u2019s most suspect sector:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8844,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[5445,4542,7,4532,4561,4525,5446,4565,4564,3206],"class_list":{"0":"post-8843","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-belgium","8":"tag-americans-abroad","9":"tag-antonee-robinson","10":"tag-belgium","11":"tag-chris-richards","12":"tag-christian-pulisic","13":"tag-mauricio-pochettino","14":"tag-mens-national-team","15":"tag-miles-robinson","16":"tag-weston-mckennie","17":"tag-world-cup-2026"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116305609616314638","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8843"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8843\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8844"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}