Mauricio Pochettino felt there were positives to take from the United States’ 2-0 defeat to Mexico despite admitting “it was not a great performance”.
Having beaten Panama on Saturday in Pochettino’s first game in charge, the USMNT were second best in Guadalajara as they faced their old rivals without key men Christian Pulisic, Timothy Weah and Weston McKennie.
Raul Jimenez put the hosts ahead with a wonderful free-kick midway through the first half and his persistence then allowed Cesar Huerta to double the advantage four minutes after half-time.
Final. pic.twitter.com/AFfYgMgr2X
— U.S. Soccer Men’s National Team (@USMNT) October 16, 2024
The States never really looked like getting back into the game, leaving Pochettino frustrated.
“It wasn’t a great performance,” Pochettino said. “It’s perfect for us to learn [from]. We started the game well, but after we conceded the goal after 22 minutes the impact was massive for us.”
The former Tottenham, Paris Saint-Germain and Chelsea boss felt the result, and occasion, could prove useful as they build to the World Cup in two years’ time, however.
He added: “Overall, I think Mexico was a little bit better than us and they fully deserve the victory.
”But for us, this is a process that we started 10 days ago and today was a great opportunity for our players to [be in] a very difficult place to play and I think we can only improve and learn from this experience.
“We wanted to win. I think we need to be positive about this type of game. We need to play more games like this to improve the knowledge that we have.”
