Mauricio Pochettino will set the United States men's national team the goal of ultimate success at next year's World Cup, but to help achieve that, the team must get used to doing the "dirty work," Antonee Robinson has told ESPN in an exclusive interview.
Robinson, 27, was named 2024 U.S Soccer male player of the year in January and has enjoyed a brilliant season with Fulham in the Premier League. He has helped the club to ninth in the English top flight, and has grown into one of the most-admired left-backs in world football.
His immediate focus is on helping Fulham into the European places and further progression in the FA Cup, but he is fully aware next year's World Cup is on the horizon. Men's football's biggest tournament will be hosted by the U.S., Mexico and Canada, and the Pochettino will be going there aiming to win the whole thing.
"Poch is very win-driven, and he said to us, you know, there are going to be games where the football is not going to be pretty to watch," Robinson told ESPN. "And he used a great example of saying like, watch Argentina, and watch their players. They're very good players, but they're all ready to like fight and hit people and do the dirty work, which is something we need to improve on because there's games where we haven't done it.
"I know we're capable of it. A lot of us playing in European leagues where it's very structured and not [many] things you can get away with, whereas you go to CONCACAF and people can like step on my foot in a huddle and walk away and nothing happens. So getting that flip side of it is gonna be important for us."
Robinson has been used both as a wing-back under Pochettino, and also in an inverted full-back role where he's slotted into central midfield. He said he can see the USMNT manager is doing all he can in limited opportunities to maximise his understanding of the team.
"He's obviously going to use every window he's got to test players in different positions. Realistically, his short term goal is winning stuff, but slightly longer into next year, he's gonna be trying to win the World Cup so he's got a brief window to try and figure out, 'what can I do with different players if I'm playing this team? Can he play there? Can he play there?' It's nice to see him doing that with, with me and different players.
"I think that's only going to help the team and there's going to be a few windows that Poch can try and do it, but I think when he does do it -- and it might not work every game -- but figuring out how he can use each player successfully is gonna be really beneficial to the team.
"One of my favorite videos is the Tiger Woods interview [from 1996] where he's getting asked how he's going to perform and he says, 'oh, I'm gonna try and win the tournament.' And the interviewer is like, that seems a bit naive to say you're going to win against some of these guys as you are young and you're new or whatever. And he's just like, 'why go to a tournament if you're not trying to win?' And that's, that's how we feel."