Requested immediately if Gio Reyna would get started Saturday’s high-profile exhibition game in opposition to Germany (kickoff at 3:07 p.m. ET) in East Hartford, Connecticut, U.S. males’s nationwide group trainer Gregg Berhalter declined to tip his hand. 

However there’s minute query that Reyna, who was once on the middle of a post-2022 Global Cup hurricane that almost averted Berhalter from being rehired because the American citizens’ supervisor for the 2026 Global Cup cycle, could have a task to play games within the recreation in spite of having logged simply 26 mins for German membership Borussia Dortmund since struggling a leg crack in June.

“Gio’s done a great job this week in training,” Berhalter mentioned Friday morning throughout his pre-match information convention ahead of the U.S. squad skilled at Rentschler Farmland. “He looks really sharp, really strong. You can see his quality. And for us, it’s about, how do we build him up same way we have other players in the squad and get the most out of him for him to help the team the most, and for him to return to Dortmund in really good shape?”

How precisely Berhalter and Reyna have begun the method of repairing their fraught courting of their first USMNT camp in combination since ultimate wintry weather’s drama is a subject of a lot intrigue for each the U.S. media and the nationwide group’s fan bottom. Reyna was once no longer made to be had to journalists within the lead-up to Saturday’s competition. Berhalter, for his section, had minute pastime in discussing the pair’s off-field dynamic on Friday. 

“I know that’s going to be on people’s mind,” Berhalter mentioned. “What I would say is that we’re moving forward. I’m not really wanting to talk too much about the past. I think it’s about talking about the future.”

The rapid day revolves round Saturday’s uncommon assembly with the four-time global champs. However merely taking part in Germany isn’t plethora for a U.S. group whose personal mentioned objective is to virtue the 2026 Global Cup on house landscape as a chance to “change soccer in America forever.” For the U.S. avid gamers to develop into family names in their very own nation, those are the varieties of suits that they should virtue to end up they’re decent. 

“Eventually we’re going to have to learn how to beat the top teams. It’s gonna have to happen if we’re going to be successful at the World Cup,” Berhalter mentioned.

“That’s why we play this game. We play these games to win,” he persisted. “That’s what we’re going to be focused on. I think big picture-wise, for the coaching staff, it’s also about the process and how we go about doing it and how, for us, it’s really important that we play our game and win and not just win the game.”

If the hosts are to emerge victorious on Saturday, Reyna could have to play games a vital function — whether or not that’s from the start or off the bench. However there’s additionally the query of the place the 20-year-old attacker is deployed.

“Whether Gio starts as a winger, whether you play him as a central midfielder, whether we play him in a 4-3-3 [as an] attacking midfielder —  a lot of things to consider,” Berhalter mentioned. “We have options.”

Later all, the method of reintegrating Reyna into Berhalter’s squad has simplest simply begun. “We’re all aware of his game time in these last months,” Berhalter mentioned. “We want to put him in a good position [so] when he goes back he can get on the field, make an impact for Dortmund.”

Doug McIntyre is a football essayist for FOX Sports activities. Sooner than becoming a member of FOX Sports activities in 2021, he was once a group of workers essayist with ESPN and Yahoo Sports activities and he has lined United States males’s and ladies’s nationwide groups at a couple of FIFA Global Cups. Observe him on Twitter @ByDougMcIntyre.

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