This World Cup reminds U.S. it is not a true soccer country. It might never be

But in reality, this performance was worse. So much worse.

The U.S. men's team will never have this kind of opportunity again, or at least not for a very long time. It was a home World Cup, with enormous and supportive crowds, a rare event for the Americans. The U.S. hosts had every advantage served up, from requiring no qualification process, to a cushy draw, to unparalleled ease of travel and climate conditions, to the nation's president actually interfering in competitive protocol (and in the process tarnishing the team's final game and sporting reputation).

But in the end, the overall results were unimpressive. The Americans beat three teams that were in the tournament because of the expanded field. And when the U.S. team faced a seasoned European opponent, in Belgium, the result was what it has almost always been throughout the team's history: The U.S. just wasn't good enough.

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The team's record against European teams not named Bosnia and Herzegovina is 0-11-2 since 2021, and in World Cup games since 1990 is 1-14-7. Six of the eight teams in the quarterfinals are European; the Americans' inability to beat European teams is an ongoing problem.

The team representing a country of close to 350 million couldn't muster as solid a performance as the Cape Verde team, from a country of 530,000.

For years we've been waiting to see progress from this team. This result feels like regression.

Even with all three co-hosts eliminated, the World Cup will go on, with many of the world's elite teams and players still at work. It will be a success, the stadiums will be packed, FIFA will keep making money off absurdly priced tickets, the streets and bars will be an ongoing party. The United States loves the big event.

But the United States is not a true soccer country. And I'm not sure we ever will be.

The enthusiasm for the world's greatest sporting event will probably not translate into a significant bump for MLS, one of the world's second-tier soccer leagues. Will hosting this competition send millions more kids flocking to the game? They're already there, that is, if they can afford to be.

Part of our fundamental problem as a soccer country is the way we develop our players, through a broken system that prioritizes a family's ability to pay. Sure, some kids from underserved communities get spotted, cultivated and find their way into top programs and academies where their bills are covered. But the system is set up in such a way as to discourage those kids from even trying to break in; the message sent by our youth soccer system is that they don't belong.

Many of the players on the current senior team roster made it through that broken system and into clubs in Europe, playing professionally since they were teenagers. They were even prematurely dubbed our "golden generation" - laughable since they hadn't accomplished anything - because they were so young in 2022 in Qatar and seemed primed to do something significant in this World Cup.

But, in truth, the two best players on the roster were not produced by the American system. Folarin Balogun spent just his first month of life in New York, a birthright citizen, and was raised in London. Malik Tillman, whose father is an American serviceman, was born in Germany, entered Bayern Munich's youth system at 13 and has never lived extensively in the United States.

The face of the team, Christian Pulisic, had a forgettable World Cup - beyond his first 25 minutes in the first game - and his critics are piling on in the aftermath. That's what happens when the prelude to your biggest moment includes opting out of national team duty to rest for the summer. It's also the result of being overexposed in every World Cup advertisement on American television, even appearing alongside Lionel Messi. Pulisic has always seemed a reluctant figurehead but he may not have that position much longer: He'll be 31 at the next World Cup.

One obvious area of regression for the U.S. team has been defense and goalkeeping, which used to be about the only way the Americans could stay competitive. Matt Freese's goalkeeping blunder that led to the third goal, a mistake that would have been unacceptable on a U-12 team, was a reminder of how far we've fallen from the days of Tim Howard, who made 16 saves against Belgium in 2014.

U.S. Soccer surely deserves some of the blame for this exit. They re-upped uninspiring Gregg Berhalter to coach through a second World Cup cycle, despite a predictable exit in Qatar and an embarrassing controversy after. Then they fired him midway through the cycle and had to rely on hedge fund billionaires as they scrambled for a real coach.

Mauricio Pochettino was shocked at the state of the American program when he arrived. He had just 20 months to do something about it. He's a professional club coach at heart. It seems unlikely, despite the nice paycheck, that he will want to stick around for another cycle and try to fundamentally change a culture and an attitude that still prevails.

One of my main memories of this World Cup will be the Paraguayan player who, the night before the first game against the United States, began to cry in a news conference, overwhelmed by the honor of wearing his team's crest in a World Cup after a 16-year absence.

For that player, for that country, football is oxygen. It is water and bread. It is, as Dani Rojas says on Ted Lasso, life.

For our country, soccer is just a game. One that we're still not very good at.

July 8, 2026

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Ann Killion

Sports Columnist

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