U.S. coach Mauricio Pochettino denies Brentford link: 'I never talked to them'

Doug McIntyre

Soccer Journalist

MINNEAPOLIS — A report out of Ireland on Saturday stating that U.S. men’s national team coach Mauricio Pochettino recently interviewed for the since-filled Premier League vacancy at Brentford is false, Pochettino exclusively told me.

“This club never contacted me,” Pochettino said when shown the report a day before his squad will meet Costa Rica on Sunday at U.S. Bank Stadium in the Concacaf Gold Cup quarterfinals (7 p.m. ET on FOX).

Pochettino, the former Chelsea, Paris Saint-Germain and Tottenham Hotspur boss who has also led Southampton and Espanyol, took over the USMNT last September on a contract that runs through next summer’s U.S. co-hosted FIFA World Cup. This isn’t the first time the 53-year-old Argentine has been linked with other Premier League openings since leaving the European club game for his maiden international job.

Earlier this month, when Tottenham fired Ange Postecoglou after two seasons, Pochettino threw cold water on speculation that he could return to Spurs. Sure enough, the London-based team lured highly regarded Danish manager Thomas Frank away from Brentford a few days later.

The Bees subsequently hired former Republic of Ireland midfielder Keith Andrews, who worked as Frank’s set-price coach with Brentford last season. But Irish outlet The42.ie made waves on both sides of the Atlantic on Saturday by reporting that the club interviewed Pochettino and former Nottingham Forest and Leicester City coach Steve Cooper before ultimately offering the position to Andrews.

Pochettino told me that the report was false, adding that Brentford never even approached him, let alone formally interviewed him for the post.

Because Pochettino is under contract with the U.S. Soccer Federation, any club or rival national team that wanted to inquire about his interest or availability would need to ask the USSF for permission to speak to him first. Failure to do so would be considered tampering — or what the British call “tapping up.”

Officially, Premier League rules prevent such approaches from taking place, even informally. In practice, teams often work agents and other back channels to gauge a potential player or manager’s interest before making contact officially.

But that’s not what happened with Brentford, according to Pochettino.

“I never talked to them,” he said.

Pochettino has a 8-3 record as USMNT coach. The U.S. advanced to Sunday’s match as Group D winners after beating Haiti, Saudi Arabia and Trinidad and Tobago in the first round. Should the Americans advance, they’ll face either Canada or Guatemala in Wednesday’s semifinal in St. Louis.

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