USA vs. Venezuela Preview: 2025 Begins

For the United States Men’s National Team, 2024 was a massive disappointment. They posted a record of just 6-6-2 (W-L-D). They were eliminated from the group stage of Copa America on home soil, which led to the dismissal of Gregg Berhalter as manager. A huge opportunity to provide on-field and off-field momentum for the approaching 2026 World Cup was totally wasted. Fortunately, US Soccer seems to have pushed all the right buttons since then. None of those buttons was bigger than the hire of Mauricio Pochettino as USMNT manager. Pochettino comes to the US with a better resume than perhaps any USMNT coach before him, having managed in Spain’s La Liga with Espanyol; in England’s Premier League with Southampton, Tottenham Hotspur, and Chelsea; and in France’s Ligue 1 with Paris Saint-Germain.

Pochettino immediately set to work rebuilding the USMNT and the shattered psyche of the fan base. He won three of his first four games to wrap up the calendar year: 2-0 at home to Panama, 1-0 on the road against Jamaica, and 4-2 at home against Jamaica. It’s worth noting that with the road win against Jamaica, Pochettino has already matched the number of CONCACAF road wins recorded by Gregg Berhalter in his nearly six years in charge.

Now comes his first ever January Camp. The annual USMNT gathering, sometimes derisively referred to as “Camp Cupcake”, is typically a low-key affair with mainly out of season MLS players coming in to gain fitness before preseason starts. It typically culminates with a friendly against a CONCACAF opponent. With the 2026 World Cup on home soil rapidly approaching, however, every game for the US is an opportunity to capture that elusive combination of on-field and off-field momentum. The first of two games for this US at this January Camp is against Venezuela.

The roster called in by Mauricio Pochettino is, as expected, mostly MLS based players. But it does feature a decent blend of players with a good amount of international experience and inexperienced players looking to break into the national team.

In goal, Zack Steffen has 29 international appearances and is the most experienced of the bunch. Also present is Patrick Schulte, who has just two caps to his name but has performed well for the Columbus Crew and also played all four games for the US U-23 team at the Summer Olympics in Paris. The back line is where the bulk of the international experience on the roster lies. Tim Ream has 66 caps, Walker Zimmerman has 42 caps, Miles Robinson has 30 caps, and Shaq Moore has 19 caps. The rest of the roster in the midfield and up front has a combined four career international appearances. In the midfield, perhaps the most exciting prospects are Benjamin Cremaschi (a teammate of Lionel Messi’s at Inter Miami) and Diego Luna, who was shockingly left off the roster for the Olympics. And the striker position is where the question marks are. Perhaps most intriguing is the inclusion of Matko Miljevic, who is currently without a club after a falling out with Newell’s Old Boys in Argentina and a lifetime ban from a Canadian indoor soccer league for striking and spitting on an opposing player.

The 2026 World Cup is getting closer every day. It has been billed as having the potential to dramatically, and forever, change the fortunes of soccer in the United States for the better. One of the most important parts of ensuring the home World Cup is a huge success, is having a national team that is playing well before, during, and after the tournament. Last year’s Copa America performance did some pretty severe damage to whatever optimism there was around the US team. While these two January Camp games against Venezuela and Costa Rica may not be but mere friendlies, a pair of convincing wins, coupled with wins in three of the final four games of 2024, could go a long way towards kick starting a resurgence of optimism around the US team. And if the US is successful before the World Cup and at the World Cup, then the sky is the limit for the growth of soccer in the US.

Venezuela’s 2024 was almost a reverse image of the USMNT’s. They won all three group stage games at Copa Ameria and made it to the knockout rounds before eventually falling to Canada on penalties in the quarter-finals. Unfortunately for La Vinotinto, it was all downhill from there. After their Copa America group stage finale against Jamaica, they did not win a single game the rest of 2024. They played seven games and lost three of them, with the reaming four being draws. They are currently in 8th place out of ten teams in CONMEBOL World Cup Qualifying, where only the top six teams automatically qualify and the 7th placed team goes into an inter-confederation playoff. Manager Fernando Batista has, like Mauricio Pochettino, has called up a squad with mostly inexperienced players. Of the 24 players on Venezuela’s roster, only five of them have double digit caps. The remaining 19 players have a combined 16 caps. Three of their 24 players are based in the US: goalkeeper Javier Otero of Orlando City, defender Ronald Hernandez of Atlanta United, and midfielder Daniel Pereira of Austin FC.

Notes:

1. This is the USMNT’s second appearance at Chase Stadium in Ft. Lauderdale. The first was in December of 2020 against El Salvador.

When, Where

Saturday, January 18, 2025

Venue: Chase Stadium

City: Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

Time: 2pm CT

TV: TNT

All-Time Series

USA leads 3-1-2

Last Meeting

Date: Sunday, June 9, 2019

Venue: Nippert Stadium

City: Cincinnati, Ohio

Attendance: 23,955

Result: USA 0-3 Venezuela

Next Game

Date: Wednesday, January 22, 2025

Competition: International Friendly

Match-Up: USA vs. Costa Rica

Venue: Inter & Co Stadium

City: Orlando, Florida

Time: 6pm CT

TV: TNT

Photo Credit: Goal.com