CINCINNATI — On a muggy Wednesday afternoon in Washington D.C. last month, Gregg Berhalter sat across a table from three reporters, leaned forward, and confronted his most irksome dilemma.
Six months before he leads the U.S. men’s national team to the World Cup, he didn’t have a consistent striker; was he concerned?
“Well, I mean, I don’t want to underplay this,” he began. “But France won the World Cup without a striker scoring a goal. It could be done, right?”
He was not, of course, comparing the USMNT to 2018 France. His point was that, although he’d love to have a ruthless poacher leading his line, “it’s not that it’s dire,” he said of the striker situation. And four weeks later, his players backed him up.
In their first of four friendlies between now and Qatar 2022, the USMNT roared past Morocco, 3-0, and made Berhalter’s point better than the head coach ever could. Their three goals came from a midfielder, Brenden Aaronson; from a winger, Tim Weah; and on a penalty won by another winger, Christian Pulisic.
Haji Wright, the hottest American male striker on the planet, converted that penalty, and at the very least earned an extended look from Berhalter. His movement was sharp. He took his one chance from open play confidently, though he fired his shot right at the goalkeeper. He then celebrated his debut goal with a point toward and hug of Pulisic, his one-time team roommate who handed him the ball at the penalty spot.
But it was the USMNT’s first-half performance, with Wright still waiting in the wings, that was most impressive. Pulisic expertly ran in behind off the left wing, deftly controlled a long ball from Walker Zimmerman, and set up Aaronson for the opener.
Weah, who has played up front at times throughout his young career, spanked a 20-yard shot past Moroccan goalkeeper Yassine Bounou for the second.
Jesus Ferreira, who started at striker, latched onto one chance, created by Aaronson. His shot was relatively tame. But throughout 45 minutes, he did his job. The USMNT doesn’t need him to score goals, or stretch an opponent’s back line. Because they have non-strikers who can do that.
Pulisic and Weah have, over the past few years, developed off the ball. They’ve learned to do the back-line stretching. They’ve learned to dart into the box with the ball on the opposite wing. They aren’t poachers, but they know how to get into positions to emulate poachers. Pulisic has the speed, and Weah the technique to fuel a system that will essentially be goalscorer-by-committee.
The U.S. doesn’t need a striker to propel it to the World Cup knockout rounds. It can win two or three games in Qatar via goals scored or created by Pulisic and Weah; by Gio Reyna, Aaronson, Weston McKennie and others. It can supplement their contributions with set pieces, and full-team moves.
“Would I want our striker to be scoring more goals? Of course,” Berhalter said last month.
But the USMNT reinforced on Wednesday that more goals from a prototypical No. 9 aren’t necessarily necessary.
Read More: USMNT beats Morocco, and offers a clever answer to its striker problem