U.S. men’s national team head coach Gregg Berhalter has said John Brooks has not been called in since last fall because he does not fit the team’s game model.
Brooks had been a USMNT regular for several years before Berhalter opted to exclude him for a set of November World Cup qualifiers, and the defender has not been back with the team since.
The 29-year-old is undoubtedly one of the most talented defenders at Berhalter’s disposal, having been a starter in the Bundesliga for nearly a decade, but in an interview with ESPN’s Futbol Americas, the coach explained that Brooks not playing a high line with former club Wolfsburg was detrimental to his national team chances.
“I called [Brooks] before the November camp, and I said, ‘John, listen, here are some things that are lacking in your game, that I don’t see fit our game model, and that we need to address,'” Berhalter said.
“We want to play with a very high line, right?” he added. “So ideally, if he went into a team that plays with a high line, and we can see that every week, how he’s dealing with space behind him, it would really help us get a picture of what he can do for our team. So, he hadn’t been doing that with Wolfsburg.”
Brooks is now a free agent after leaving Wolfsburg and Berhalter insisted, as he’s done several times, that the door is still not closed to Brooks in terms of making the 2022 World Cup squad.
“To me, it’s a question of: Let’s see where John ends up,” Berhalter said. “Let’s see what club he ends up at and let’s see how his form is throughout the fall. And then we can evaluate.”
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