Guinea’s under-23 football team have secured their place in the 2024 Olympic Games, where they will play the USMNT in Group A.

Guinea defeated Indonesia 1-0 in Thursday’s play-off — Ilaix Moriba scored the only goal of the game from the penalty spot — in Clairefontaine to become the 16th and final qualifier for the men’s tournament in Paris.

The match was a play-off between the sides from the African and Asian federations, with Guinea joining fellow African nations Egypt, Morocco and Mali in the finals.

The U.S. will play Guinea in their third group stage match in Saint-Etienne on July 30, after opening their campaign against hosts France in Marseille on July 24 and playing New Zealand in Marseille three days later.

In the women’s tournament draw, the USWNT have been drawn in Group B alongside Germany, Australia and Zambia.

However, Zambia’s women’s team may be prevented from participating due to an ongoing political crisis within the country’s football association.

FIFA, world football’s governing body, has said the Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) faces being suspended — and therefore Zambian…

This year’s Copa América will be closely watched, but the ensuing Olympic Games in Paris will have just as much to say about the broader state of the U.S. men’s player pool. Unlike the women’s side of the Olympic tournament, the men’s competition relies on players under the age of 23, though every team is allowed to bring up to three over-age players in the 18-man squad.  

If the team that U.S. Olympic coach Marko Mitrović selects comes close to matching the program-best 4th place finish in 2000, it would be a potential indicator that the U.S. can now consistently produce top-end talent. If the U.S. is embarrassed in Group A, though, some will fear that 2026 will be the program’s high point for quite some time.

After the draw in March, Mitrović touted a “big pool of players that we are following” for potential inclusion. He stressed that he wants to bring “the best 18 players” he can, and didn’t show his hand yet about areas where he feels he can sacrifice depth given the squad limitations of an Olympic tournament.

GO DEEPER

USMNT to play France in Olympic tourney opener

With that in mind, here’s a crib sheet of Olympic-eligible players to track in the coming months. This list focuses on MLS players, and with good reason: A full half of the most recent…

The United States have launched their new jerseys ahead of this summer’s Copa America.

Nike, which is the kits’ manufacturer, unveiled the home and away kits on Monday morning.

The men’s collection will be released on March 21 — the day the USMNT face Jamaica in the CONCACAF Nations League semi-final — while the women’s collections will be available to purchase in June.

The cuffs and collar of the home shirt feature a distinct red, white and blue graphic – the colours associated with the national flag of the U.S.

The away shirt is predominantly blue but features a splash of red and white in the bottom left-hand corner.

---

How to follow the Copa America on The Athletic…

---

Nike says that the kits “are tailored to provide mobility, breathability and venting so athletes can perform at their peak during this summer’s tournaments”.

From June 19 to July 14, the U.S. will host the men’s Copa America, joining as one of six guest nations for the prestigious South American tournament. It will be the second time in eight years that the U.S. has hosted some version of the event following 2016’s Copa America Centenario.

Ahead of the tournament, the USMNT will play two friendlies: one against Colombia on June 8, followed by a clash against Brazil on June 12.

GO DEEPER

Copa…

Ah, The Best. An awards show to crown the cream of the crop. Did we not do this a few months ago?

FIFA and the Ballon d’Or, generally considered football’s most prestigious individual award ceremony, parted ways in 2016, with The Best forming in its wake. Unlike the Ballon d’Or, where journalists get the final say, The Best is selected by fans, a panel of journalists plus national team captains and coaches. Even better, all the votes are public.

The list of votes makes for interesting reading, highlighting rivalries and alliances. Cristiano Ronaldo, for example, has only voted for Messi once since 2010 — a second-placed finish behind Robert Lewandowski in 2020. Messi has voted for Ronaldo — his great rival and peer — twice: third in 2018 and second in 2019.

Despite winning The Best award for the third time on Monday evening, Messi did not go to London to collect the trophy. Instead, he continued pre-season training with new Inter Miami team-mate Luis Suarez in South Florida. But that’s the boring bit. Let us dig into who voted for who, as Messi and FC Barcelona and Spain midfielder Aitana Bonmati won the headline men’s and women’s awards.

GO DEEPER

Bonmati named women’s footballer of the year at The Best FIFA Football Awards

Who did and didn’t vote for…

U.S. Soccer president Cindy Parlow Cone’s unique career path is a big part of why she wanted a national training center to come together under her stewardship. 

Parlow Cone was a two-time Olympic gold medalist and a World Cup winner as a player for the U.S. women’s national team. She holds a USSF “A” coaching license and has won championships as a coach at the professional and collegiate levels. Parlow Cone knows the game beyond the administrative conditions that govern the sport. She’s not just another suit, as they say. 

Around the world, it’s believed that having more “football people” in prominent roles within a federation is needed. That’s obviously not an automatic barometer for success, but Parlow Cone believes that her sporting past, and the major events that are coming to the U.S. in the near future, allowed the training center project to ultimately get off the ground. 

“Me being a former player, and really seeing what this (national training center) can mean for elite soccer in our country at the national team levels, but then also the coach in me at the youth in the grassroots level, seeing how transformative a facility like this can be for every person in our sport — whether you’re a coach, a player, a referee, or a professional just trying…

U.S. men’s national team coach Gregg Berhalter said he and Gio Reyna spoke over Zoom “weeks ago” and called it a “positive conversation” ahead of Reyna’s return to the U.S. team from injury — and his first camp since Berhalter was re-hired.

It will be the first time the manager and player have been together since controversy unfolded after the World Cup. The issues began with Reyna’s behavior at the tournament in Qatar and Berhalter alluding to those problems during comments at a leadership conference, albeit without mentioning Reyna by name. That eventually led to Reyna’s parents, U.S. Soccer veterans Claudio and Danielle Reyna, providing information to then-U.S. Soccer sporting director Earnie Stewart about an incident 30 years ago in which Berhalter kicked his then-girlfriend, now-wife when they were freshmen at the University of North Carolina. That prompted an investigation into Berhalter that stretched for months. Berhalter was cleared for employment at U.S. Soccer in March and eventually re-hired as manager of the national team in June.

GO DEEPER

How did we get here? A timeline of the Berhalter and Reyna family’s rift

“First of all, the conversation was a positive conversation,” Berhalter said. “Appreciative of him taking time and being able to…

USFF sporting director Matt Crocker has confirmed that Gio Reyna will be called up to the next USMNT camp, if healthy, after talks with head coach Gregg Berhalter.

Reyna’s relationship with Berhalter was under the microscope after a tricky 2022 World Cup for the pair and the subsequent incident which saw details of the 50-year-old’s historic domestic abuse of his wife leaked by Danielle Reyna, Gio’s mother.

Amid that incident and USFF investigation, Berhalter’s contract expired after the World Cup on December 31 but he was rehired in June to replace interim coach B.J. Callaghan.

In August, Berhalter said he had not spoken to Reyna since the World Cup, having said after he was returned that there was “work to do” on his relationship with the Borussia Dortmund player.

But Crocker confirmed the pair had spoken “recently” when speaking to media on Sunday.

“Of course, we’ve had conversations with Gregg,” Crocker said. “Gregg has had conversations with Gio. They’re in a place where as soon as Gio is fit, he’ll be in the next camp.

“I can’t wait for him to be on camp so we can stop talking about this. I think until that moment happens we’ll still keep writing about it.

“I think both Gregg and Gio are in a good place to move forward and that’s the best…

In The Journey to the Cup, The Athletic tells the stories of players and teams as they work towards a place in the 2023 Women’s World Cup. Follow along as we track their progress as they prepare both mentally and physically for a chance to shine on the game’s biggest stage.

Savannah DeMelo breezes into Racing Louisville’s offices with a green drink, fresh off of a post-practice shopping trip with her younger sister. She loves a good sale — at one point Racing Louisville had a partnership with Zappos and she was buying shoes on deep discount every week. She firmly believes that if you find something you like on sale, buy two of it, because you know you’re going to use it. She comes off as someone with a good head on her shoulders.  

She also comes off as someone with a heck of a foot on her leg.

It was a goal so nice that Kudzi Musarurwa at All For XI wrote an ode to it. Her teammate, Alex Chidiac, was so wowed by her form she called it “disgusting.” 

“My dad sent me that (article), that was crazy. It was very cool,” DeMelo said. 

“A lot of people like to make the joke ‘cause I use the outside of my foot a lot instead of using my left foot,” she continued. “I think my left foot is not horrible….

As Gregg Berhalter reached the airport on Wednesday, a day after a 10-hour interview in an undisclosed location with U.S. Soccer leadership, he got a call from sporting director Matt Crocker.

“You’re the guy,” Crocker told him.

The decision sealed a months-long process and worldwide search in which Crocker evaluated more than 10 candidates for the U.S. men’s national team coaching job and eventually narrowed the process down to a few finalists. Ultimately he landed on Berhalter, who had led the U.S. through its previous World Cup cycle, but had also navigated off-field issues since the team returned from Qatar, most notably an independent investigation into a physical abuse incident 30 years prior involving he and his now-wife, Rosalind Berhalter, when the two were freshmen at the University of North Carolina. 

In March, the independent investigation cleared Berhalter to work for the federation again, but there was no guarantee he would get that opportunity. After the long interview on Tuesday and a follow-up with Crocker and Cindy Parlow Cone on Wednesday morning, Berhalter headed to the airport to go home. 

Then Crocker called.

“It was a great feeling,” Berhalter said Friday in the press conference announcing his return as manager. “You can imagine what the last…

Wrexham, former U.S. men’s and women’s national team players, a Spanish football legend and TikTok stars are competing for $1 million in a 7v7 tournament — and it’s happening at WakeMed Soccer Park in Cary, North Carolina.

Yes, you read that right.

What seems like the most fanciful of fever dreams is a reality at The Soccer Tournament (TST), going on now in North Carolina’s Research Triangle. Set up like the World Cup, 32 teams signed up for the tournament which is set up with groups of four competing in a round-robin group stage and a round of 16 single-elimination knockout before the finals. The five-day event concludes Sunday, June 4 with the winning team claiming the collective $1 million prize. Second place, as the organizer says, gets nothing.

From the founders of The Basketball Tournament, which started in 2014 by Jon Mugar, the idea of TST was born in 2020 when soccer players Mike Volk and Henry Tembon reached out to Mugar about the soccer version of the competition. With the help of former MLS star Alecko Eskandarian, and NBA’s Chris Paul, TST began.

The Athletic has on-the-ground coverage all weekend from Pablo Maurer and Felipe Cardenas, but here are a few quick hits to get you up to speed.

Where and when is the TST tournament?

The TST tournament is taking…