'A hard player to analyze' - former USMNTer Stu Holden talks Christian Pulisic's form, U.S. World Cup hopes, and Cristiano Ronaldo's last dance

GOAL: I wanted to start with Christian Pulisic. He's struggled a bit recently. How worried are you about his form?

HOLDEN: Pulisic is a hard player to analyze in a way. I think so much of his on-field performance seems to be tied to his general well-being and happiness, and yeah, and I think sometimes we, we underestimate what, what that does and how much that weighs on players, from a mentality perspective. Mental health is a much bigger subject these days, and I wouldn't say that I ever felt that I suffered from that, so it feels hard for me to speak to, but what I would say for Christian Pulisic is heading into the 2022 World Cup, he had one goal in 18 competitions, a career-long five-game drought with the U.S. at that point. Now he's on an eight-game drought for the U.S., yet he had a great World Cup. That is what I fall back on, and that I think gives me confidence.

Here's my other reason that I'm not worried about Pulisic: Weston McKennie has stepped up, and I think McKennie now has become the most important player to the team. I think in some ways, that alleviates some of the pressure from Christian that he feels. I think sometimes that weight of the shirt, or the weight of expectation, is maybe a little bit too much. The kid just wants to play. We always do this. It's like you're the captain, you're the star, you need to do this. He does, for the U.S. to be successful at the World Cup, Pulisic has to be a star, but I don't think he has to be the only star, and I think that that has become McKennie, who I think plays with a much more laissez-faire mentality of, 'I'm just out here having fun, and I compete, and I kick the crap out of you no matter what.' And I think that's the best thing going right now for Pulisic.

GOAL: We are maybe a little bit guilty of putting a lot of pressure on these guys. But it's deeper than, he can just dribble better than everyone else, right?

HOLDEN: Yeah, because what separates the best from the very best, then from the legends, is that ability to consistently perform at the absolute highest level, when everybody's expecting it. He's had these peaks and troughs that are bigger than the very, very elite players, and I think that's something he's still got to find a way through. It's why he can be the best player in Serie A for six months, and now a guy that's not even starting every game for you. Like, six months ago, we're like, "Wow, this is going to be an insane summer." He took the summer off with the U.S. He's not been injured, and then he picks up a niggle, and then he starts to self-doubt, and then, allegedly, there's stuff going on off the field with his personal life. I try to separate those and focus, and that's what's hard to quantify sometimes, but I think at the end of the day I believe enough, and I've seen enough, that I think when the moment comes, he's going to step up for this team.

GOAL: And what do we make of Pochettino and some of his decisions? We all know he's an accomplished coach, but do we think he's going to leave after the tournament?

HOLDEN: Yeah, but I also don't think that that was the expectation. I think this has been such a big event that we've been ramping up towards, that it can be treated separately. This is the World Cup and we recognize how important it is to have success, and U.S. soccer understand that, and that's why they went out and made a big hire and spent the money they did.

But this is his legacy. When it comes to the USMNT, he's only going to be viewed about this World Cup, and how he does. If he does the same that everybody else has done for the rest of time, it'll be viewed as a failure, because you know he was hired to push this program and this team higher and further than we've ever been. We've been in the round of 16 consistently. We've been in a quarterfinal in 2002.

I like the things that he has done. I think his eyes have been opened a little bit more to what he expected this job would be and what it would entail, and the type of player that we currently have. I think it's taken a little bit of a while for him to adjust to finding how to get the best out of the American player and the American mentality, but not accepting what the American mentality is, and trying to also reframe our mentality. I think about it in the way that Germany come to the World Cup, and they don't book their hotels through the group stage. They book through the final, and there's countries that view this as not a game to play, but a game to win, and we should view it in that way. We should fight and scrap and compete in a way that we maybe haven't before. I think we had gritty teams, and that's been at the heart of our DNA. To compete with the very best and biggest countries in the world, we're not there talent-wise, and we need to be a little bit more pragmatic and trust in that our spirit and our togetherness and our determination, which I think he's brought.

That's how we're going to find that edge, and that we're going to be hard to beat, and not the teams that try to win the game by being the best team on the field. We're just going to be the hardest team to beat on the field. So that's my X factor when it comes to Pochettino, and I think I've seen enough that he's a smart enough and accomplished enough coach and visionary, and that he's going to put that type of team out on the field in these games.

GOAL: So, any World Cup favorites? You've mentioned before that you're very high on Portugal?

HOLDEN: I think Portugal is the most likely team to win a World Cup that has never won a World Cup, and join that elusive club of eight nations in our history since 1930 that have won a World Cup. I think Portugal is the likeliest contender for sure. They're the most complete team, and then they have an x-factor player that is, while 40-years-old, still one of the best players in the history of the game, and capable of scoring goals. And I was reminded of that, calling the Nations League final last year. Portugal played Spain. Spain were the better team for 60 minutes. Ronaldo was a passenger. He touched the ball five times. He gave it away 10 times, and I said on the broadcast in the 60th minute, like Portugal have to flip this game back in their favor, and they need to sub Ronaldo, because you need more energy pressing from the front, they need, you know, just a different look, and literally 30 seconds later, he scored, and went on to win that game.

And the Portuguese midfield, I think, is the best in the world. Vitinha, Joao Neves, Paulinha, they just have so many different ways in which they can hurt you, winger wise. They've got tons of depth. Bruno Fernandes is coming off his best season in his career within the Premier League. Ruben Dias in defense. They've got a good goalkeeper, Jose Sa. Nuno Mendes is at left back. I could keep going on and on and on. They have studs and players that play at the biggest teams in the world. I'm very high on Portugal.

GOAL: Moreso than Argentina? This could be the final Messi-Ronaldo World Cup

HOLDEN: Yeah, I just think that the players for Portugal are in better form than the Argentine team currently, and considering that I think Messi, carried Argentina to a World Cup, and I don't think Portugal have to be as reliant on Cristiano Ronaldo. But Argentina, they Julian Alvarez and Rodrigo de Paul, what level is he at? They have a grittiness and a competitiveness that I think can give them that edge still, and that's like defensively they were so good, but Cuti Romero, I don't know what form he's going to be in, and I think defensively Portugal are a better team this time around than they've been before. So, yeah, I'm very big on Portugal.

GOAL: Has MLS done enough to capitalize on the World Cup?

HOLDEN: It's a hard question, right? I think MLS has been building for this moment for many years to be able to capitalize on it, and I don't think it would be even realistic to think about this as like some type of meme stock that pops off on a massive trajectory just because the World Cup happens. I think this has been years in the making. It's the eight years of investment in youth academies, in adding teams to a league, adding MLS Next Pro, adding youth soccer verticals. If we try to quantify what the '94 World Cup did, MLS was born on the back of that in '95.

They've done ad buys with Fox Sports. They're going to blow these games out on network television, and your hope is that fans that watch the World Cup and get a taste of soccer, we're going to birth a new generation of soccer fans this summer. People will see this game in a different way for the very first time here up close and personal, and hopefully get to go to some games. But you know their kids and those beyond like that, that will be shaped by these experiences, and I hope that those people then say, "I want to go experience a game in my local market. I love that environment. Where can I go?" Well, you can go watch LAFC or the Galaxy, you can go watch Cincinnati, you can watch the Columbus Crew. So, I think we're prepared for this moment, and the hope is that the play on the field is good enough to capture that attention. We're an attention economy, which is already hard enough, but we have to keep investing. It doesn't mean we stop because the World Cup is gone, and that's where you have to get into these local communities and give opportunities for these kids to see the game and get them to the games and help them become fans.

GOAL: And finally, who wins the World Cup?

HOLDEN: France.

GOAL: Why?

HOLDEN: It feels cheap saying this now, because they've been in two-straight finals, and they won one. But then, even the final they lost, you know, Mbappe scores a hat trick, he's still in the prime of his career. They lost on penalties to Argentina. The more I've kind of dug into my prep and watched France play, I'm not the only one who says this, they could fill two teams that could get to a semifinal. They leave off Camavinga from their roster. He plays for Real Madrid! He hasn't had his best season, but I'm talking about a player that plays at Real Madrid, like that's crazy. And so I just think that they continue to birth another, another generation that becomes behind the Griezmann, the Giroud, the Lloris, that is as good and as accomplished, and playing at as big teams. So, nobody has more big-game experience, nobody's getting phased as little as the French, and I have them pretty solid as my favorite to win the World Cup.