Giovanni Reyna was apparently listless at the World Cup
What: REUTERS
US national coach Gregg Berhalter was about to send a player home at the World Cup. “We were ready to book plane tickets,” he says. According to consistent reports, it is Giovanni Reyna from Dortmund.
Dhe Dortmund Bundesliga professional Giovanni Reyna was said to be about to be kicked out of the US national team at the World Cup. Head coach Gregg Berhalter confirmed he almost sent one player home, but did not name the player. Several US media, including ESPN and The Athletic, reported that it was the 20-year-old BVB player.
“It doesn’t really matter who it was,” Berhalter said of the reports, but didn’t deny them either. Reyna only played a supplementary role in the US team at the World Cup, which was eliminated by the Netherlands (1-3) in the round of 16. In this game, Reyna was substituted on at the break, in the group game against England (0:0) he was allowed to play from the 83rd minute. They were his only two brief assignments at the World Cup.
“We had one player who clearly didn’t live up to expectations on and off the pitch. As employees, we sat together for hours thinking about what we would do with this player. We were ready to book a plane ticket home, it was that extreme,” Berhalter said at a leadership briefing at the HOW Institute for Society in New York. The statements were later published in a newsletter on charterworks.com.
An apology to the team
Finally, Reyna, who apparently acted listlessly in training and thus upset the team against himself, had to apologize to the team. “The other thing we said to him was that he needed to apologize to the group. But he must say why he is apologizing. It has to go deeper than just ‘I’m sorry guys,'” Berhalter said. The apology was accepted by the team, after the discussion there was no longer a problem with the player.
US coach Gregg Berhalter is open about the tensions in his squad
Which: AFP/FABRICE COFFRINI
After the World Cup from the USA, Reyna, like the other eliminated World Cup drivers Niklas Süle, Nico Schlotterbeck, Youssoufa Moukoko, Julian Brandt, Karim Adeyemi, Thorgan Hazard and Thomas Meunier, had to appear for training at BVB and also to a mini-tournament Traveling to Bucharest last weekend. There, Reyna scored a goal in the win against Rapid Bucharest (2-1).
