This 18-year-old will be the key to America’s World Cup hopes

Ricardo Pepi is younger. He is unproven, unseasoned and unfinished. He might use a couple of extra strains on his résumé and presumably a few extra kilos on his lanky body.
But as a result of it has develop into equally evident within the early days of his profession that Pepi possesses in plentiful amount the intangible, invaluable and sometimes ephemeral magic wanted to do the one factor valued above all else in soccer — as a result of, in different phrases, he scores targets — not one of the aforementioned stuff notably issues.
Pepi, 18, could or could not develop into the striker of the longer term for the United States males’s soccer staff. Many have tried to make the place — the No. 9, in soccer parlance — their very own, and most have failed. But questions on Pepi’s long-term viability, his ceiling as a participant, can wait. At the second, there’s a World Cup to qualify for. And there isn’t a query that Pepi is the American striker of proper now.
“Pressure is nothing to him — I think he relishes it, more so than his age should allow,” mentioned Eric Quill, who coached Pepi at North Texas S.C. in 2019 and 2020. “No. 9s, when they’re in great form, it’s like, ‘Look out.’ And I think he’s as confident as they come right now.”
Ready or not, Pepi is being requested to hold a heavy accountability on his teenage shoulders. After making his debut with the United States senior nationwide staff simply two months in the past, he was the one pure striker that Gregg Berhalter, the staff’s coach, summoned for the staff’s two World Cup qualifiers this month. The first of those was a marquee match on Friday evening towards Mexico in Cincinnati, the place the U.S. received, 2-0.
The present of religion, if dangerous, made sense: Pepi, who performs professionally for F.C. Dallas in Major League Soccer, had collected three targets and two assists in his first 4 appearances with the United States. He has additionally been some of the constant vivid spots within the staff’s considerably shaky begin to the qualifying event.
Pepi is the youngest participant on a notably younger staff. (“Lose Yourself” by Eminem was the highest music within the nation when he was born in January 2003, and Tom Brady had just one Super Bowl ring again then.) The youth of the American squad has been without delay a degree of delight (when issues go nicely) and an excuse (when issues don’t go as nicely).
But the staff’s disastrous failure to qualify for the 2018 World Cup has helped coaches justify turning over a brand new leaf — observe data be damned. Pepi embodies that want to start out recent greater than anybody. He is all potential, a clean slate personified.
Yet his emergence couldn’t be extra well timed. In latest years, the United States’ program has seen promising gamers sprout up everywhere in the area. (American attacking midfielders, for example, appear to be multiplying like jack rabbits.) But the middle ahead place has lengthy been one thing of a barren patch.

“It’s the best decision I’ve made.”— @Ricardo_Pepi9 on selecting #USMNT 🇺🇸#USAvMEX x @allstate pic.twitter.com/KeWKBngGZQ
— U.S. Soccer MNT (@USMNT) November 10, 2021
Brian McBride, who performed from 1993 to 2006, stays the gold commonplace for American strikers, in accordance with Herculez Gomez, a former nationwide staff striker. Jozy Altidore got here closest to filling McBride’s footwear, Gomez mentioned. Countless others have been hyped, however few have adopted by way of.
“We could start spouting off a lot names,” Gomez, now an analyst for ESPN, mentioned in regards to the revolving door of strikers. “A lot of players have been put in the role, but not a lot of guys have taken the reins.” He added with fun: “I was one of them.”
Gomez mentioned Pepi was uncooked, however undoubtedly promising, exhibiting a pointy trajectory of enchancment within the final 12 months alone. “I think his mentality is the strongest trait he has,” Gomez mentioned. “He’s just so hungry. He’s got this arrogance about him. Borderline cocky. A swagger to him.”
That will be the case within the penalty space, however in most different circumstances Pepi is called an introvert. In conversations with the information media, for instance, he tends to meander cautiously by way of the early beats of a response earlier than selecting phrasing he has used earlier than. (The drawback with enjoying nicely, for some athletes, is that individuals wish to converse with you.) This sort of shyness is perhaps regarding for a coach, have been it not so simply, and so ferociously, shed on the sphere.
“In the dressing room he was always kind of in the corner by himself,” mentioned Francisco Molina, the previous scouting director for F.C. Dallas, who met Pepi when he was enjoying within the staff’s youth system. “On the field, he was a loud, screaming, rebellious kid.”
The very first thing Molina seen about Pepi was his spindly body. (“Like a baby deer, he said.”) The second was his regular stream of targets: He might rating them together with his proper foot or his left, together with his head, together with his knees and shoulders and shins. He can discover nearly any method to nudge the ball into the online.
“He has that instinct,” Molina mentioned. “He’s a pure 9.”
These expertise have drawn curiosity from the highest golf equipment in Europe. Among these monitoring Pepi’s growth, there appears to be settlement that his subsequent step must be a cautious, conscientious one — a spot on a superb staff in a medium-profile league, maybe, or one on a medium-profile staff in a prime league.
“You have to go somewhere where you play right away,” his U.S. teammate Chris Richards, who made an analogous transfer to Europe from F.C. Dallas at age 18, mentioned in an interview with the web site Transfermarkt final week. “Sometimes you get caught up in the big names, but it might not be the perfect situation.”
There seems to be consensus, too, on the one space the place he might enhance probably the most: enjoying together with his again to the aim. In these conditions, Pepi prefers laying the ball off rapidly to a teammate to get himself transferring once more. He doesn’t but look as comfy holding the ball and withstanding a bodily problem from a defender, the form of pause that prime strikers should grasp with a view to give their teammates time to construct an assault round them.
For Pepi, the important thing could also be so simple as placing on some muscle. “At the higher levels, the center backs, most of them are athletic beasts,” mentioned Quill, Pepi’s former youth coach. “He’s got a slim frame. He’s going to have to do a lot of work in the gym.” Molina concurred. “His body hasn’t caught up to his brain yet,” he mentioned.
Pepi’s soccer mind and physique will proceed to develop, however his coronary heart was already put to the take a look at this previous summer season when he was pressured to decide on between representing the United States, the place he was born, or Mexico, the house of his mother and father.
Pepi grew up in San Elizario, Texas, a working-class city simply exterior El Paso. He spoke Spanish at dwelling, adopted Club América of the Mexican league, rooted for Mexico’s nationwide staff and idolized its stars. Moving seamlessly between cultures was pure for him, the way in which it may be for numerous kids of immigrants all over the world.
In the top, Pepi selected the United States due to the consolation he had developed with the federation, and due to the alternatives the staff provided to assist him to thrive. “Follow your own path,” Pepi mentioned when requested what recommendation he would possibly give to a different Mexican American participant going through the identical alternative. “Make your decision with your heart.”
Michael Orozco, a fellow Mexican American who performed 29 video games for the U.S. nationwide staff, was pleased with Pepi’s alternative. But he warned that Pepi might anticipate criticism, even vitriol, from Mexican followers transferring ahead, maybe as quickly as Friday evening.
In 2012, Orozco scored for the United States in a pleasant at Azteca Stadium in Mexico City, serving to to steer the Americans to their first-ever win on Mexican soil. Orozco, who was enjoying within the Mexican league on the time and now performs for the usL.’s Orange County S.C., mentioned he was criticized by his membership teammates for scoring and, worse, for celebrating. Orozco mentioned he had no regrets, and he hoped Pepi wouldn’t have any both.
“He’s starting to prove himself,” he mentioned. “Now, he has to live up to the potential.”