It looks like Cristian Roldan won’t be on Gregg Berhalter’s final pre-World Cup roster.
The Seattle Sounders announced that the U.S. men’s national team midfielder underwent sports hernia surgery Tuesday morning.
“Cristian, after seeing a couple of specialists down in LA, actually underwent a successful groin surgery this morning,” said Sounders head coach Brian Schmetzer. “His athletic pubalgia just wasn’t getting any better.”
Roldan is expected to be out for somewhere between four and six weeks. That effectively rules him out for the USMNT’s pair of September friendlies. The USMNT is set to play Japan on September 23 in Düsseldorf, Germany, and Saudi Arabia in Murcia, Spain on September 27. Even if Roldan were to fully recover in just four weeks, the USMNT would likely have already flown to Europe for the friendlies.
How does this impact the USMNT midfield?
Roldan’s hold on a place within the squad has grown more tenuous with time, though some of that process has been out of his control. Yunus Musah’s emergence as a starter, having chosen the USMNT over England, Ghana, and Italy only last year, is one factor, while Brenden Aaronson’s rapid rise (and ability to play both in the midfield and as a wide forward, as Roldan does) is certainly another. Luca de la Torre has also raised his profile within the team, while Kellyn Acosta’s return to the USMNT fold has added to the crowd.
Still, while Roldan has seen his playing time decline, Berhalter still substituted him into five qualifiers, and in a variety of game states. It’s clear that Berhalter still sees a tactically and technically sound Swiss army knife like Roldan as a valuable player he can trust in a range of situations, and it stands to reason that he was in the frame to be called up for the Japan and Saudi Arabia friendlies.
Roldan is not the only USMNT player in doubt for the September window. Tim Weah is looking like a major doubt as well, with Lille saying on Monday that his ankle injury would require three weeks of immobilization before he can even resume training.
With Roldan unavailable, the door may be just the tiniest bit open for players like Gianlucia Busio and Djordje Mihailovic, both of whom were players Pro Soccer Wire‘s last roster projection had just barely missing out.
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