Photo: Paul Rudderow
Auston Trusty and Mark McKenzie will have their chance to be part of a new era of U.S. Soccer.
New national team manager Gregg Berhalter named the two Union homegrowns to his first 27-player roster, which will assemble for the annual January training camp next month in Chula Vista, CA.
The call-up is the first for both players, who have been involved in the national team’s youth set-up throughout their careers.
Trusty, 20, played every minute for Philadelphia in a breakout 2018 campaign — the youngest player ever to accomplish that feat. The Media, PA native’s previous national team experience includes two appearances at the 2017 U-20 World Cup.
McKenzie, 19, made 18 starts for the Union alongside Trusty in a rookie season that saw him named as a finalist for the league’s Rookie of the Year award. The youngster from Bear, DE was involved in the national team’s successful qualification for the 2019 U-20 World Cup, scoring three goals in six starts in the CONCACAF qualifying tournament. McKenzie is the youngest player called in to camp.
McKenzie and Trusty join Alejandro Bedoya, C.J. Sapong, and Fafa Picault as current Union players who’ve been called up to the national team. They will seek their first senior caps in friendlies against Panama on Jan. 27 in Glendale, AZ and against Costa Rica on Feb. 2 in San Jose.
The entire roster is made up of MLS players. The two Union players are joined on the camp roster by fellow centerbacks Aaron Long and Walker Zimmerman,
Also on the roster is former Union right back Keegan Rosenberry, who was surprisingly traded to Colorado Rapids on Wednesday in exchange for allocation money.
Berhalter and U.S. Soccer general manager Earnie Stewart — the former Union sporting director — hope that the January camp will be a first step on the road back to respectability for a national team program that has been rudderless since failing to qualify for the 2018 World Cup.
“In putting together this domestic-based roster, we started with a number of players who we think can be a core part of the group moving forward. We then looked at players that excelled this year in Major League Soccer, and finally chose players that can play a specific role in our game model,” Berhalter said. “We are very excited to start to implement our ideas about the style of play and the culture we want to develop in the National Team.”
Trusty and McKenzie hope that it will be another step on their path to stardom.
Guess they should probably trade these two as well since we saw how well Keegan and CJ did the season after a January call up…Hopefully they won’t follow that same path.
.
Congrats to both as well as to Keegan.
I appreciate this All MLS camp by Berhalter. It’s wise IMO.
.
Course when your international players are actually playing in high stakes games and over half your domestic players (who were finished playing in October) are sitting at home or in Myrtle Beach- its also fairly obvious.
.
…what will be most telling however, is what the team looks like come Gold Cup.
Well done, gentlemen. Do us proud.
Nice to see the young guys get a sniff. Let’s hope it’s a motivation to keep improving their ability. Maybe Rosenberry can help them out and keep them from suffering his fate after his call up. Best of luck to them all!