• International Friendly: United States vs Türkiye
• Date and Time: Saturday, June 7, 3:30 pm ET
• Venue: Rentschler Field at Pratt & Whitney Stadium, East Hartford, CT
• Forecast: Cloudy with the possibility of a thunderstorm, 73F/22C
• Watch: TNT (English), plus Telemundo and Universo (Spanish); Streaming on Max (English) and Peacock (Spanish); "Alt Cast" featuring Men In Blazers and Clint Dempsey available on truTV and Max
• Broadcast Team: (English) Luke Wileman (play-by-play), Kyle Martino (analyst), and Melissa Ortiz (reporter); (Spanish) Andrés Cantor (play-by-play) and Natalia Astrain (analyst)
• Kits: The USMNT will wear their new striped, navy-colored Heartbeat Kit
The first Matchday of a hugely important summer for the United States men's national team is upon us as they return to East Hartford, Connecticut's Rentschler Field at Pratt & Whitney Stadium to face Türkiye in a friendly.
This is the first of five guaranteed games Mauricio Pochettino's USMNT will play this June, one of two friendlies scheduled before the start of the Concacaf Gold Cup on June 14. Pochettino's team enters this summer on a low note, still trying to shake off the disappointment of an ugly Concacaf Nations League showing in March that saw the USMNT lose back-to-back games on home soil to Panama and Canada.
Against Türkiye, the United States men will be trying to get back to performing well at home, important considering next summer's 2026 FIFA World Cup will be played in the US, Mexico, and Canada. The USMNT and Pochettino will also be trying to suss out who among this Major League Soccer-centric roster might be ready to contribute in bigger upcoming games, like the ones at the Gold Cup and, later, at the World Cup.
The biggest of big names usually on the USMNT – your Christian Pulisics, your Weston McKennies, and the like – are not a part of the 26-player roster available for this game, but there are plenty of other players and storylines to monitor as the US plays Türkiye for the fifth time in history.
USMNT Scouting Report
• Player Availability: Goalkeepers Patrick Schulte (oblique) and Zack Steffen (knee), defenders DeJuan Jones (lower body), Sean Zawadzki (knee), and Sergiño Dest (knee), plus striker Folarin Balogun (ankle) all dropped out of the squad due to injuries.
• Goalkeeper is a position of massive intrigue heading into this game, and not just because we cover New York City FC and are intrigued by the possibility of NYCFC's Matt Freese getting his first-ever appearance for the USMNT. Pochettino publicly opened the door for other non-Matt Turner goalkeepers due to Turner's limited playing time at club level during the 2024-2025 season. Injuries to Schulte and Steffen mean Poch will have to choose between the old reliable option in Turner and two untested MLS keepers in Freese and Chicago Fire FC's Chris Brady – in which direction will Mauricio go?
• How badly will the US, playing against a solid European national team, miss the European-based members of what many consider its first-choice squad who are not participating this summer? Pulisic's absence created a mini-firestorm, but the team will also be without Fulham left-back Antonee Robinson, plus midfield regulars McKennie, Gio Reyna, and Yunus Musah, and strikers Josh Sargent and Ricardo Pepi, to name a few.
• Speaking of striker, with Folarin Balogun dropping from the roster it now seems wide open as to who starts up top for the USMNT. There's Haji Wright with World Cup and EFL Championship experience, MLS standouts like Patrick Agyemang (a Connecticut native) and Brian White, and then there's Damion Downs. The 20-year-old FC Köln striker is born and raised in Germany but with an American father, and is an intriguing player to monitor with the USMNT this summer. Downs scored 11 goals in 32 appearances in all competitions for Köln between the 2. Bundesliga and DFB-Pokal, and played previously for the United States at the U-20 and U-23 levels.
• The record for the USMNT in East Hartford, Connecticut is 5W-2D-2L since 2005. The last visit to Rentschler Field at Pratt & Whitney Stadium came on October 14, 2023, when Germany beat Gregg Berhalter's USMNT 3-1 – Pulisic scored early, but then Ilkay Gundogan, Niclas Fullkrug, and Jerome Musiala gave Germany a win in front of a sellout crowd of 37,705.
Türkiye Scouting Report
• Here's the squad Türkiye head coach Vincenzo Montella has to choose from for the visit to Connecticut:
• Arda Güler is just 20 years old yet had five goals and nine assists in 43 appearances in all competitions with Real Madrid last season. Kenan Yildiz is just 20 years old yet had nine goals and seven assists in 48 appearances in all comps for Juventus last season. Each player, according to Transfermarkt anyway, is valued at €45 million, so there could be serious young international star power on display by the Crescent Stars in Connecticut.
• After playing the USMNT, Türkiye travels within the United States to take on Mexico in Chapel Hill, North Carolina on June 10. Türkiye is prepping for the challenge of UEFA qualifying for the 2026 World Cup, as they begin play in a group that includes Georgia, Spain, and Bulgaria in September.
• A pair of players from SL Benfica in Portugal, midfielder Orkun Kökçu and winger Kerem Aktürkoglu, are cornerstones of this squad. Aktürkoglu has six goals and two assists for Türkiye in 14 appearances made in the last calendar year, while Kökçu has eight competitive national team appearances in that time while anchoring their midfield.
• Türkiye last played the United States on June 1, 2014, at what was then called Red Bull Arena in Harrison, New Jersey, part of the USMNT's send-off series before the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. Clint Dempsey scored the winner in that game, and scored the winner when the US played Türkiye in Philadelphia in 2010: No wonder Dempsey is hosting an Alt Cast for this game, though Türkiye might just be happy he's not playing.
