For the first time since 2008 the USA has qualified for the Olympic Men’s Soccer competition. It may be surprising to some that the men’s soccer at the Olympics is a “young men’s” competition. The Olympics are a U-23 tournament, meaning players must be born in 2001 or later. However, each team gets 3 exceptions to that rule.

While each team participating in the Olympics will take the tournament extremely seriously, the national soccer federations participating do not put their absolute best foot forward in the Olympics. For example, 8 players from the USA’s Copa America roster (our “A” team) are eligible to play in the Olympics by age, but zero of them are on the Olympic roster. This is in stark contrast to the Women’s Olympic competition, which is treated very similarly to the World Cup in terms of prestige and prioritization by the national soccer federations.

The Copa America and Qatar World Cup showed how volatile and unpredictable international soccer can be. In youth competitions, things are even more unpredictable, so expect the unexpected from Men’s Olympic Soccer competition in Paris 2024.

The Men’s Olympic Soccer tournament features 16 teams, split into 4 groups with 4 teams each. They will play a round robin format, meaning each team will play all 3 of the other teams in their group. The top two teams in each group (8 total) will advance to the single elimination knockout stages, just like the 2022 World Cup or this year’s Copa America. Win 1 knockout game and you get to play for a medal.

In addition to the age limits, the Olympics limit rosters to 18 players versus the 26 permitted in Copa America. On top of that, FIFA does not require clubs to release players for the Olympics, which did affect the USA’s roster selection. Even though our very best U-23 players are not on the team, the US Men’s Roster still has plenty of talent in those 18 slots.

Half of the roster is MLS-based, with the other half either playing for or in process of transferring to European teams. 15 of the 18 have played for the full national team, but typically in friendlies or tournaments where we have brought our “B” team. In other words, they are emerging talents who have a real shot at breaking into the full national team – much like Landon Donovan, John O’Brien, and Clint Mathis did after the 2000 Olympics.

In order for us to make a run at the 2026 World Cup, we need a handful of these emerging talents to develop into polished pros over the next 2 years. In particular, we’d love to see someone emerge at CB, CF, and to provide depth in midfield. The players below are closest to breaking through and/or have the highest upside with the full team. 

Here’s the full roster, which also includes our 3 players who are over the age of 23. Those are Miles Robinson (CB), Walker Zimmerman (CB), and Djordje Mihailovic (MD). We have to say we’re happy to see Robinson get a shot on a global stage after brutally missing out on the 2022 World Cup with an ACL injury. 

The USA will open our Olympic campaign with the marquee matchup of our group, and arguably of the entire group stage, when we take on France on Wednesday, July 24. France is the host nation, and they are coached by a true legend of global soccer, Thierry Henry. Almost the entire roster plays in one of Europe’s Big 5 leagues, mostly in France as you might expect. Michael Olise starred for Crystal Palace in the Premier League over the past few years, and recently completed a big money move to Bayern Munich. France also used their over-23 slots well, adding Jean-Philippe Mateta (16 goals for Crystal Palace) and Alexander Lacazette (19 goals for Lyon, one of the powerhouses of France’s Ligue Un). The USA played France to a 2-2 draw in a March friendly which certainly showed we can hang with the best. France is favored to win the Gold, with +200 odds.

Up next on Saturday, July 27 is New Zealand. 10 of their players are in New Zealand’s domestic league. 2 play in MLS, while another 7 play in mid-tier European leagues. 1 player, Goalkeeper Alex Paulson, is on the books at Premier League club AFC Bournemouth (Tyler Adams’ club). He seems unlikely to win the starting job there but Bournemouth are a savvy, data driven club, so we expect him to be a top young keeper based on their interest. Overall, we’d say this squad is competitive with the USA’s, though gambling markets give them the second worst odds (+12500) to win the Gold.

We close out the group stage with a match against Guinea on Tuesday, July 30. Don’t sleep on Guinea. Their roster is filled with talent from the Big 5 European Leagues. 7 players are in the Big 5 leagues, and their over 23 slots include Naby Keita, formerly of Klopp’s Liverpool. Most of the rest play in Europe, but for second tier teams in major countries, or top tier teams in less competitive countries (e.g. Greece, Belgium). It’s a solid team. Markets are giving them mid-table odds at winning the gold, with +4000 odds.

You can find details on all the matches for both our Women’s and Men’s teams at the Paris Olympics at Dos a Cero’s USA Olympic Soccer HQ.

16 years is a long time between appearances, especially when we have been in 8 of the last 9 World Cups. One reason it’s been so long is that it’s a smaller tournament, so only 2 teams from CONCACAF (our FIFA geographic region) typically qualify. Another is that we’ve lacked some youth talent during some of these years. We failed to qualify for the 2018 World Cup, and our string of not making the Olympics began in 2012, when many of the players from that World Cup cycle would have been in the Olympic program. You can see the lack of talent in the 2018 “World Cup” squad below, with fewer players in Europe’s top leagues (Tiers 1 – 3, includes the “Big 5” plus other highly competitive leagues such as Portugal and Holland) than any other time this century. 

There’s also frankly been some bad luck. In CONCACAF, the finalists from the regional U-20 tournament qualify for the Olympics. That means qualification for the 2024 Olympics came down to a single match, the semifinals of the 2022 CONCACAF U-20 championship. We won this time, but we’ve lost at that stage in the last two qualifying processes. The use of a single match rather than a longer qualification process is another indicator of the lack of prestige associated with the Men’s Olympic Soccer competition.

This list might be more interesting than the list of players who made the roster, as several of these guys look like future USMNT contributors in our view. Keep in mind, this list does not include the 8 players from the Copa America roster who would be eligible to play in the Olympics by age.

Aidan Morris was left off so he can focus on his move to Middlesboro in the English Championship (England’s second tier). Cade Cowell has been capped for the full national team and scored in that March friendly against France, and just didn’t make the cut. Esmir Bajraktarevic is one of the most talented young Americans, but will still be Olympics-eligible in 2028. Bryan Reynolds, Rokas Pukstas, and Brandon Vazquez were not released by their clubs. Diego Luna was a key player for this team all cycle, and was probably our most dangerous attacker at the last U-20 World Cup, but was controversially left off the roster.

We only get to bring 18 players to this tournament, and the games come every 3 days, an unusually short turnaround for tournament play. That means squad depth and positional flexibility are paramount in roster selection. That does explain some of these roster decisions but only raises more questions on players like Cowell and Luna, who can play CF or on the wing.

This team isn’t bad, but it’s clearly not the best product the USA could put out on the field. From Dos a Cero’s perspective, this is hugely disappointing, especially after the Copa America disaster. The Olympics are one of the few times that people who are not yet soccer fans will pay attention, and we are failing to maximize the opportunity to bring new fans into the fold and grow the game in this country.

Still, this team is favored to emerge from our group. The most likely scenario would be USA finishing second, and playing the first place team from Group B, which is likely to be Argentina. A win there and we would be playing for a medal. Not impossible but we’ll need some luck. USA is 6th favorite to take home the Gold out of 16 teams (+2000 odds) so we’re certainly in the conversation for a medal. Fingers crossed!