United States men’s national team coach Gregg Berhalter has been fired after the team’s historic early exit from the Copa América group stage last week, according to multiple reports Wednesday.
Berhalter’s exit comes after the United States’ 1-0 loss to Uruguay, marking the first time in the history of the country’s five appearances in the CONMEBOL event that the United States has failed to advance out of the group stage.
It was also the first time that the USMNT was eliminated from the group stage of a World Cup, Copa América or Gold Cup that it hosted.
The 2024 Copa América, hosted across 14 U.S. cities, was considered a dress rehearsal for the 2026 World Cup, which the United States will host along with Mexico and Canada.
After the loss to Uruguay, Berhalter, who was first appointed in December 2018 and re-hired in 2023, said he still believed he was still the right man to lead the USMNT.
U.S. Soccer Federation sporting director Matt Crocker said in a statement after the game that a review would be conducted into the team’s exit. Asked in his post-game news conference whether he was still the right person to lead the U.S. team into the 2026 World Cup, Berhalter responded with a simple “yes.”
However, he admitted that the performances had not been good enough.
“Just to see the guys’ faces in the locker room and to see the emotion of the staff and players, we’re bitterly disappointed with the results,” he said. In June of 2023, Berhalter, 50, signed a new contract which ran to the end of the 2026 World Cup.
Crocker said at the time that the organization was looking for someone with a “growth mindset on and off the field.”
The 2023 agreement came after a six-month investigation into Berhalter’s behavior following a rift with the Reyna family.
Berhalter had skippered the U.S. to a round-of-16 finish at the 2022 World Cup and was in the process of re-signing with the USSF in 2022 when he spoke at a leadership conference, alluding to a player at the World Cup — later identified as Giovanni Reyna — who was almost sent home for responding poorly to a reduced role.
In response to the comment, Danielle Reyna, the mother of the U.S. midfielder, publicly disclosed the details of a previously unrevealed 1991 domestic violence incident involving his wife Rosalind that occurred when Berhalter was in college, about the same age Reyna was at the 2022 World Cup.
The disclosure sparked the investigation as to whether Berhalter should continue as coach but ultimately U.S. Soccer cleared Berhalter to resume coaching the USMNT.
