'We behave as one because we go further together' - Inside Mauricio Pochettino's USMNT coaching staff, process, principles and World Cup development mindset

Ask around USMNT camp and you generally get the same message: Pochettino empowers. Every player says virtually the same thing, as if reading from a script. 

"He gives us the confidence to not be nervous," winger Alex Zendejas said, summarizing what many of his teammates have expressed over the last year. "He wants us to just get on the ball and do what we do at our clubs. He gives us that creativity that players like us need."

Pochettino and his staff came in with a mission. It was to uplift, not tear down. That applied to players, of course, particularly to new ones being introduced to the team. It also applied to the program as a whole, one which had reached a low ebb just prior to his hiring.

"We are here because something needed to change," Pochettino said this month ahead of what seemed a defining win over Japan. "That is why, less than one year ago, we came in to be in charge of the national team here. We are different and we have different words. But we are here because we want to share with you and we want to learn from you. We don't want to teach anyone. We have our plan and that is a process."

That process, realistically, began in New York on Sept. 10, 2024, the day Pochettino was unveiled by U.S. Soccer. He was coming to rebuild a broken team, and he wasn't coming alone. Joining him was a group of colleagues that have been with him for much of his coaching journey.

Assistants Perez and Miki D'Agostino, who had been with him since his first coaching role at Espanyol, were among them. So, too, was goalkeeper coach Toni Jimenez, also an Espanyol original. Pochettino's son, Sebastiano, joined the staff as a sports scientist. When Pochettino signed on to be the face of American soccer, he brought a group that had been together, through good and bad, for the better part of a decade.

Because of that, there was no real onboarding period. Even as Pochettino's staff integrated with the established figures at the federation, the key, from the onset, was to establish foundations quickly. That is much easier when you're surrounded by faces you trust.

For years, Perez has essentially been an extension of Pochettino. These days, he's his most trusted confidant and the man behind the scenes that helps ensure everyone is aligned.

"Obviously, we are a very united staff," Perez says. "We've been together for a long time, and I think we share the same principles. We don't overstep anything beyond Mauricio. We try to represent him. That's the main goal - represent him in every way. The way we speak, the way we connect to clubs, the way we work with analysts, fitness coaches, medical staff. It was all about us setting principles because, at the end of the day, everything in live is run by principles. You can have your methods, but it's the principles that are the most important."

Importantly, there's a relatively flat hierarchy on the staff. 

"We wanted to make it clear from the start that we are only one staff," Perez said. "No one is above any other member of the group. I may represent the coaching staff, but I'm no higher than the doctor or the head physio or the sports scientists. We all represent the principles of Mauricio, and we all translate that to performance."

Under Pochettino, everyone has their roles. The analysts work hardest, Perez jokes, because they're the ones documenting every single game featuring every single player in the pool. Pochettino and his staff then monitor the reports, watching as many matches and highlights as the conceivably can in a given week. 

The Argentinian manager earned some criticism when he revealed that he doesn't personally meet with players, in an effort to avoid favoritism. That doesn't mean his team isn't always on the move, though. Since the staff's arrival last year, the staff have visited more than 50 clubs in at least 10 countries. They've met with players, coaches, staff and everyone in between. 

For the staff, one that has coached at some of the top clubs in the world, that has been an adjustment. There is no home base and no day-to-day contact. The processes have changed, in a way. The workload hasn't. The goal, again, is to represent Pochettino and give the USMNT coach everything he needs to lead a team into any given camp.

"My main responsibility is to keep everyone connected," Perez says. "Every single department, I need to make sure we are not missing anything. Obviously, that's a bit easier at a club. We can't complain and say, 'It's a hard job' because it's not if you are well organized and have the right group of people around you. We do. It's pretty nice to work every day... If you track his career, he is being consistent in making people better.

"Obviously, there are realities or scenarios that are complicated, and it's difficult sometimes to see. But I think he's a guy that tries to make a group of players become one team. It's not my staff and the federation's staff - it's our staff. We have different positions, but we behave as one because we go further together."

The work done in between camps is different. Ultimately, though, the staff's passions haven't changed. At their core, this is a group that loves, more than anything, working with players. That process has changed, too.

Pochettino inherited a supposed "golden generation" of players, but one that has had that status questioned thoroughly in this World Cup cycle. It was their Copa America failures that led to Gregg Berhalter's firing and Pochettino's arrival. From the onset, the goal was build on Berhalter's foundation with some aspects of the team. 

Other aspects, though, needed to be torn down. That thought process applied, largely, to the player pool. No one, not even established regulars, could be entitled.

"I think it is well known that the previous regime was based on a small group of players," Perez said. "They relied on them and they thought that, the more together they were, the better they will get. We felt like we didn't agree with that, and we wanted to provide the same level of care to everyone in terms of tracking, analysis and visiting. For us, it was important to visit, club by club, and speak to the coaches. We spoke about players that were already in the pool, too, but we were asking the same questions to every single coach."

The past was in the past, and the entire focus was looking forward.

"It doesn't matter what this group of players has done in the past," he said. "This is like a club. What you did yesterday, it builds you a little bit of credit, sure, but the next game game and the next game and the game after that, that will increase or reduce your credit.

"As an example, let's say your player was playing for Real Madrid four years ago. Now, four years later, let's say they're playing at different clubs. They're now in different environments, not saying worse or better, but they need to be treated in different ways. Here, it's the same."

In the initial camps, Pochettino got to know the foundational pieces with tweaks here and there. The January camp, meanwhile, was a transformative experience for the staff. It was the first time the group had time to work - and it was a building-block moment. After March's CONCACAF Nations League disaster, though, Pochettino really pulled the trigger, kickstarting a rebuild that would, ultimately, define this 2025 calendar year.

"It was a wakeup call," Pochettino said of the Nations League. "We needed to start a different process and a different approach with analysis. I think they understand us now, but also we understand the players. I think that happening helped us, a little bit, to understand that the most important thing is the national team. The federation, this is more important than any single name."

After an experimental Gold Cup, one admittedly impacted by external factors, Pochettino meshed rosters in September. Several notable players were absent. Those on the outside criticized. Following the USMNT's lopsided loss to South Korea to start September camp, Pochettino was sitting on a 9-7-1 record as USMNT boss. It included those Nations League defeats, the Gold Cup finale loss to Mexico and two pre-Gold Cup losses to Switzerland and Turkey that exposed just how much was left to be done within Pochettino's experimental group.

Even as the losses piled up, Pochettino and staff never wavered, publicly or privately. Prior to camp, the staff determined that September would be one last chance to experiment before really honing the squad. Even after the loss to South Korea, they didn't alter course.

The coaches needed to see players, either for the first or the final time, to let them know where they stood in case they needed them down the line. A win over Japan, albeit a weakened version, seemingly got the USMNT back on track. For the coaches, nothing would have changed even if that win never came. It was part of a plan.

"If you have two fullbacks or wingbacks, it's different than if you only have one," Perez says. "If you get to a certain moment in a game and you want to attack, you need a player that can attack. It's not just that Pochettino arrives and he's a magician and says, 'Oh, this guy never attacks at his club and can now go 10 times into the final third to play crosses.' It's not like that. We had to find and manage players that have been coached by other people."

Probing the depth of the player pool is intended to provide options, both in terms of tactics and in case of absences.

"What happens if you have a goalkeeper that is unlucky with injuries or illness?" he said. "What if, in the last game, you're missing two centerbacks? You have to select players that you don't know. They don't know how you want to build up or how you want to set up. Another guy would say, 'No, no, no we need to focus and give all the minutes.'

"Sometimes, we make drama that we don't have time. I'm sure if games right now we're official, some players might have less opportunities. But I can tell you, no, it wouldn't be zero opportunities."

Identifying players for different tactics was key, yes. As the USMNT prepares for a potential switch to a three-at-the-back system, Pochettino and his team needed to know which pieces fit where and when. He also needed to know which players he could rely on in general as he put the principles in place that, he hopes, will define how this team approaches the road ahead.

There are plenty of buzzwords in coaching. Every coach wants the same things: mentality, fight, passion. Every coach wants to play dynamic attacking soccer, but also wants to be solid defensively. Principles, by and large, are the same everywhere. It's how you execute them that differs.

"I think every coaching staff says similar things and it's not like we are doing things that other people don't know how to do," Perez says. "It's the way that you do it and the way that you gel everything that's the difference. The ingredients are in the market for everyone, but how the chef uses the ingredients is what makes a good or bad dish. It's the same for us."

For Pochettino, the principle is simple: this has to mean something. Players have to wake up every day determined to succeed. The national team is both a reward and obligation, one that requires players to put in more than they might ever get out of it. That, at its core, is the baseline of Pochettino's process: everyone needs to work hard, and everyone needs to work hard together.

"On some days, motivation is a very short feeling because everyone is so used to external motivation, but motivation has to come from the inside," Perez says. "We have to make people realize that the standards come from the inside. Our main objective, then, is to make sure that we can reduce the gap between your best day and your worst day. If your best day is a 10 and your worst day is a two, you get exposed. 

"The point is to get the highest level possible regardless of winning or losing. There will always be little ups and downs, but that's easy to control. In a short tournament, you can't have a good day and a bad day because, on that bad day, you're out. That's the main principle. From there, we can build the other principles - defensive principles, attacking principles, goalkeepers, particular topics that define things."

The Gold Cup, according to many who played in it, was the camp in which that main principle took seed. Throughout the tournament, the talking points centered around culture more so even than performance. It's why, at the end of it all, Pochettino was tearful after the loss to Mexico. He so desperately wanted his side to be rewarded for what they put in.

"That is not going to kill us, it’s going to make us stronger, and I want you to never give up," Pochettino said in Behind the Crest. "I think we still have time to be better, keep improving, but please don’t change."

Pochettino's hope is that, with that in place, he can now start developing the rest. Against Japan, the U.S. showed a tactical wrinkle in a new system, one that could illustrate the way forward. Meanwhile, younger players such as Diego Luna, Alex Freeman, Jack McGlynn, Matt Freese and Max Arfsten are now integrated alongside the established order. 

The attacking DNA can be established. The defensive setups can be tweaked. Those cannot be done, Perez says, without the initial ingredients in place.

"One thing that's guaranteed is that our players are proud," Perez says. "That's the biggest feeling you can have in a squad: that you have a lot of people that can say they are proud of themselves and show that they are proud of themselves."

Pride, confidence, belief - those can carry you a long way at a World Cup. But that's not all Pochettino and his staff are focused on.

Despite never working in international soccer before as a coach, Pochettino knew what he was signing up for. He played at the highest level for Argentina. In September, he reflected on his own World Cup experience. In 2002, Argentina went to the tournament in near-perfect form. It didn't stop them from falling apart en route to a shocking group stage exit.

Pochettino knows, then, that, sometimes, these games and these tournaments are won on the margins. One of Perez's big projects since the staff's arrival, then, has been working on those margins.

"It's fair to say that, when the federation approached us, they gave us almost like a blank check to invest in things," Perez said. "Probably, the guys before us might have been a little more restricted in terms of budget. The technology that we are using now, there are things we have that the guys before couldn't have. We are using Flywheel. We are using vibration platforms where everything is portable, which is expensive to make all of the technology portable.

"We have nutritionists full time, more performance chefs. We have more resources and I'll say that we're trying to achieve what is, in our view, the best for the players. That's not just money, but also the right people for the job."

The off-the-pitch elements are nearly as important as the skills and tactics on display in matches.

"Players now face three different methodologies: club, national team and most have personal trainers," Perez said. "The combination of the three? It's a nightmare. That's why we want to reinforce what's in our control, which is nutrition, supplements and analytics, all of those things. Those are facts, and facts aren't up for interpretation. It's why we're implementing biological assessments to control fatigue and stress with real data. It's important to make micro decisions. That's a huge part of it."

Under Pochettino, camp is just as much about the 20-something hours off the field as the few spent training on it. Nutrition is tracked with great detail. Sports scientists play a key role in decision-making. As for the players, they are given freedom, but, as Pochettino said this summer, the culture has to police itself.

Players are free to see friends and family, sure, but not at the expense of the national team. The staff's main goal is to monitor as much as humanly possible, on and off the field. That said, no amount of technology can help you against some of the world's best teams; you simply have to go out and beat them. 

In Perez's view, there's an off chance that the details could be the difference between success and failure and because of that, the staff refuses to leave a stone unturned when it comes to the technology and resources at their disposal.

"The federation has supported us with the budget to implement a lot of things," Perez says. "Equipment, personal resources, everything. We are using two devices to help on deliveries for set pieces. We have implemented a lot of things that, I hope, one day pays off. We wanted to give the players the best things on the market. We don't want an excuse that we didn't have something someone else had.

"It's not because technology or data will help win matches, but it does help us have better processes and it helps us coaches, in theory, with better decision-making. I'm learning things that I never expected from some of the projects we started. There's always something to learn."

There will be more lessons on the way to the World Cup, which, ultimately, is the sole moment Pochettino and his team will be judged on. It's the one, they hope, that will make everything worth it.

A World Cup is important to everyone involved. It might be doubly so for Perez. He recognizes that it might be his only chance at achieving something he thought would never be possible.

"It was always my dream," he says. "I wasn't a professional player. I was missing some qualities, so I'm not like the other assistants that say, 'If only I didn't get injured.' I didn't get injured. I was missing quality. I had to make it another way. That's why, for me, this will be the proudest moment of my football life. The first minute of that first game, I can't wait for that.

"For me personally, this is a place that gives us an opportunity to discover a new world and a new way to work. It's a way to experience the biggest event in football, a World Cup, from the inside."

Part of the reason Pochettino, Perez and the rest of that staff were entrusted with that challenge was, in truth, because they'd experienced most everything else. At Tottenham, they went to a Champions League final. At PSG, they managed some of the best players in the world while leading a roster so star-studded it would make Hollywood blush. 

He led a minnow at Southampton and a bloated behemoth at Chelsea. Despite all of that, a World Cup is a World Cup. This is different. Lionel Messi isn't walking into the USMNT. Neither is Kylian Mbappe or Neymar. Deep down, though, Pochettino and his people understand that. Managing stars is fun. Making them is even better.

"We are keeping the same desire to work with people that didn't make it yet," Perez says. "Most coaches would probably say the same, but we were with the biggest and most famous club in the world in 2022 with so many elite, elite names together. Messi, Sergio Ramos, [Marco] Verratti, [Angel] Di Maria, Neymar, Mbappe, all at once. It may never happen again.

"The last level of players are so complete different in terms of quality. You can win a match with OK performances because one of those guys can score a goal that no one in the world is able to do."

With the USMNT, it's about identifying and unlocking the potential of a number of up-and-coming players.

"What we still believe is in this faith that, with the right process, we can make a player better. We believe we can grow their skills," Perez said. "Alex Freeman or Max Arfsten, we see potential in them. We see ourselves as someone that can make the final push. I'm just saying their names because they are young, but there are plenty of guys.

"When I do a finishing session, I see Damion Downs and [Patrick] Agyemang and you can see the potential. I did finishing with Harry Kane, Neymar, Messi, Mbappe. I know what players are capable of, and I know how players can improve. We're talking about superstars there, but we believe that everyone has a chance to be a good player."

Will they be good enough to win at a World Cup? Even Pochettino can't predict that. World Cups are fickle. It's a lifetime of preparation that, sometimes, leads to one moment. One shot, one goal, one mistake - legacies are defined in an instant, for good and bad.

Can Pochettino and his staff get his players ready for those moments? Will all of the steps along the way lead to one big leap? Ultimately, and this is the key, will this all be worth it? If they stick to the right principles, Pochettino says that the answer will be "yes."

"In life, what is risky is not to take a risk," Perez says. "That's a sentence that we say every time the players come in. If you're afraid to make decisions, you don't grow. We can't just come here and sit in a chair waiting for players to get better. The players that have been selected for camp after camp, they're selected for a reason. They are managed a certain way for a reason."

And so the process continues on. So, too, does the work. One year down, yes, but the toughest challenges are still ahead for a staff that, from day one, has been focused on the light at the end of the tunnel.