USMNTactics: Paraguay pummeling

Throughout the World Cup, I'll (probably) be breaking down the USMNT with instant reaction articles. We begin today with a statement win over Paraguay.

I spent the day travelling back to New York City, and I got home about two hours before the USMNT was set to kick off their run in the 2026 World Cup. The game might’ve taken place in Los Angeles, but the energy was palpable on the east coast. Yeah, this is Knicks country at the moment. Try telling that to the guy in a Timothy Weah kit I chatted up on the E train, or to the pair of rain-soaked American Outlaws rushing to get out of a storm and onto the 6 line. Jalen Brunson’s throne is secure, but the buzz around the national team is real.

Put it this way: people care about the USMNT, and they care about this tournament. The best compliment you could pay the squad is that they returned that admiration in kind on Friday night.

The 4-1 drubbing over Paraguay to open group play showed exactly what the United States can be at their best. Mauricio Pochettino’s 3-2-4-1 attack knew when to push the pace and how to maximize stars. His counterpress was rabid, preventing Paraguay from settling into any semblance of a possession game until the match was all but decided. If the US keeps up the level going forward, we’ll need to re-assess our expectations – particularly if Christian Pulisic and Folarin Balogun continue to play like this.

As compared to the final warm-up friendly against Germany, Pochettino made just one change: getting Chris Richards into the lineup. The United States’ best pure center back, Richards replaced Miles Robinson next to Tim Ream, with the hope of stabilizing what was an otherwise familiar group. In other words, the USMNT needed the Crystal Palace star to anchor their 4-4-2ish defense, stay clean at the back of the attacking 3-2-4-1, and make sure the transitions between those two modes went off without a hitch.

Richards did just that, giving the rest of the lineup the chance to get expressive. Paraguay, managed by Gustavo Alfaro, simply couldn’t figure out a way to weaponize their own 4-4-2 to stop the United States. Richards, Ream, and Alex Freeman had an innate man advantage against the pressing strikers; if Paraguay tried to push a winger up to make weight, they were played behind immediately. Again and again, the USMNT leveraged that edge.

Here, the pattern couldn’t be clearer. Freeman possesses the ball, and Paraguay left mid Miguel Almiron (with his line of sight aimed upfield) is frozen. Almiron doesn’t know if he should close to Freeman or mark Sergio Dest at the sideline, so he does nothing.

The chain reaction continues further up the USMNT’s right side. Because Almiron doesn’t commit, Paraguay’s right back has to consider whether he’s the man to deny Dest. He, too, is frozen. Rather than let the advantage go to waste, Weston McKennie curls upfield from the No. 10 spot to challenge that player. Freeman will hit him, and it’ll be a chance for the United States. McKennie’s choice here is telling. Ostensibly, he’s part of a four-man midfield meant to dominate the center of the park. Here, though, he’s got the freedom to roam if there’s space for the taking.

At the back, Freeman and Ream completed roughly 140 passes, combining for 13 progressive passes per Futi. The USMNT had an undeniable ability to break lines from their defensive line, but the real difference against Paraguay was Christian Pulisic’s dribbling in the attacking zone. Build for build’s sake is one thing, but Pulisic could pay it off in style.

The move that put the United States up was a case in point. The sequence started like this…

…with a Ream interception and a quick passing sequence to Freeman preventing Paraguay from settling. Meanwhile, Dest, McKennie, and striker Florian Balogun all read the play and know they can lead a break, allowing Freeman to slip a pass forward to create a transition overload.

The difference this time? Instead of McKennie having to go it alone, he can dribble inside, find Pulisic lurking off the left, and let the AC Milan star go to work.

Pulisic would beat two men, taking an intentionally leading touch into the box that had the side effect of drawing yet more defensive attention. With Paraguay overdrawn and multiple runners challenging the six-yard box, it was all too easy to cut the ball back and force a go-ahead own goal.

By the time he subbed off at the half, Pulisic had gone 3/5 on the dribble, made six progressive carries, and taken numerous touches in the opposing box. His off-ball movement was terrific to boot; multiple center-to-left curls occupied bodies and let Jedi Robinson find room to be expressive. 

Robinson was a one-man thermometer for the USMNT’s ability to kill the game off while staying on the front foot – the opposite of the self-immolatory “prevent defense” pitfall you might see in American football. When the lead grew to 2-0, for instance, Robinson wasn’t playing like a winger. Instead, he sat far deeper in something closer to a resting back four, stretching Paraguay and opening a through to Pulisic. A 43rd minute breakaway through Dest and McKennie was stylistically different, but the same idea was there: Robinson knew when to get conservative and bolster Pochettino’s defensive shape if other teammates could punish Paraguay with lesser numbers.

Up 3-0 at halftime, Pochettino knew it was over and reacted as such. Sebastian Berhalter entered for Pulisic, Malik Tillman slid to the left, and the USMNT gladly traded some of their final-third verve for a true resting presence in the midfield. Rather than risk his most important player, Pochettino added a stabilizer into his shape without giving up the attacking principles this roster is still trying to hone. 

It wasn’t all perfect. Paraguay’s goal was a reminder that the USMNT is still shaky in second ball and post-second ball situations; the concession featured a bad step from Richards, a similarly meek intervention from Ream, and Freeman sitting in no-man’s land on the weak side behind them both. While Richards mostly shut down striker Antonio Sanabria and stopped second balls from really becoming a problem, that’s a theme to track going forward.

Still, the vibes are good good. With Australia on deck for next Friday, the United States has already built a tangible sense of momentum that shouldn’t abate when they next play up in Seattle. Between the flow of the midfield, the end product from Pulisic and Balogun, and solid-to-decent performance from the back line, there simply aren’t many nits to pick. If the USMNT can keep tapping into the energy that the World Cup provides, there’s no reason they can’t keep pushing on.

Odds & Ends

• It bears repeating: Folarin Balogun had the goods tonight. I tend to think the “can Pulisic unlock compact defenses?” question is the big one for this team, but everything changes if Balogun is this good as the No. 9.
• You can probably tell if you got this far, but I was very high on Weston McKennie’s off-ball movement, and the same thing was true of Malik Tillman. None of that happens without Tyler Adams being selfless and covering ground at the No. 6 spot. Leaving Adams as the lone mid in a “3+1” resting base worked swimmingly against a Paraguay side that couldn’t figure things out, but better teams are going to make stops and generate counterattacks. We’ll see if Adams can emerge as a stopper if and when that happens – or if a true pivot with Sebastian Berhalter starting is the move.
• I can pass exactly zero judgement on Matt Freese after a match where he faced one shot on target, but I’m trusting the process.
• Love a good "rub it in your face" garbage time goal.
• Andres Cantor is an international treasure.
• Digging the Pochettino work shirt look with dangling eyeglasses. 
• Tom Cruise in brown velvet belting the national anthem while David Beckham sits there uncomfortably…that’s what freedom looks like.