Cavan Sullivan: The Future of U.S. Soccer

Cavan Sullivan is 16 years old and already being talked about like a solution, not a prospect.

Three goals in three games, against professionals, not peers. He’s cutting through grown men, and in a U.S. player pool that still craves difference-makers, that matters. A lot.

Tim Howard has seen enough to plant his flag.

“In the next four years, there are going to be 115 players that play for the national team,” he said on the Unfiltered Podcast. “Who’s better than this kid? Who’s better than this kid that doesn’t deserve an opportunity? I’m not saying he plays every game, but he should be in the conversation to be playing every game.”

Howard didn’t stop there. He knows the context, knows the limitations of the American talent factory.

“For all the naysayers out there, I’m not saying to gift this kid something he hasn’t earned on a silver platter. I’m saying we are not Brazil, Argentina, Holland, Spain, England, Germany. We don’t produce these players.”

Sullivan doesn’t sound intimidated by any of it. If anything, he’s already picturing the stage.

“Thinking about that Belgium game, I think I could come into that game on the right side and make a difference,” he told Alexi Lalas’ State of the Union podcast. “You have to believe in yourself. You have to think you can help your team win. Obviously it’s not my team yet, but I’m always dreaming and hoping for call-ups.”

He’s not the only teenager staring at the U.S. crest and wondering when his moment comes. Zavier Gozo has been living in that space for a while.

The winger, then at Real Salt Lake, made the preliminary list for the World Cup squad. He could see the plane. Mauricio Pochettino, though, decided it was too soon to take an uncapped teenager to a World Cup. Gozo stayed home, moved to Crystal Palace, and kept the chip on his shoulder.

“I do think I deserved to be there. I’m going to be honest,” he told The Late Run. “But obviously it’s the coach’s choice. Maybe he didn’t think I was ready, or whatever it is, but it just put a fire under me to make the next World Cup and show why I should be there.”

So how does Pochettino decide when a kid becomes a full international? There’s no formula. No age threshold. No magic number of club minutes.

He hears the noise about workload. He’s not buying most of it.

“I know the mindset of the coaches,” he said. “That sometimes the coaches say, ‘Oh, I have a 17-year-old guy that plays in the MLS, but when the national team calls, we say no because they need to rest’. If you’re 17, and you need to rest? Yeah, we have a big problem.”

Physically, he trusts them. The real test, in his mind, lives above the shoulders.

Maturity is the first filter. Not just in how they play, but how they live. Do they work when no one’s watching? Do they chase improvement or coast on hype? Do they treat people properly?

“I think respect is the most important thing, and they need to be respectful,” Pochettino said. “And of course, we want players with talent. We want players who feel brave, feel confident, but not feel things they don't show. I think you are only entitled to talk a little bit out of order if you are Messi.

“If you win eight Ballon d'Ors, okay, you can talk with a certain arrogance, but even then, … if you are young and you start to talk that you can play here, you can play there, or you can play. I say, I don't believe that this is the right way to build your career in the best way, no. And that is why we need to be careful.”

The message is blunt: talent opens the door, but behavior decides if you walk through it.

Pochettino also knows the depth chart matters. Some spots are clogged, others are begging for a breakthrough. There is no blanket policy.

Goalkeeper is the perfect example. Lots of candidates, only one shirt.

“I think we are going to give some [opportunities] to some new players, not only in that position, but in different positions,” he explained. “We’ll have the possibility to add a new player and to give them the possibility. I think for us now it’s about not only thinking about today, but also to think about the future and 2030.”

That date hangs over everything. But the road to 2030 is crowded with tournaments that demand real decisions, not just long-term theory.

The Olympic Games are coming fast. There’s another Gold Cup on the horizon and potentially a Copa America. Each competition forces Pochettino to coordinate with Steve Cherundolo, who leads the U.S. U-23s, and map out who goes where, and when.

The idea is to bleed a few youngsters into the senior team now, give them caps and scars, then send them into the Olympics with something more than hope. That doesn’t mean the next few windows will turn into U-23 showcases. Pochettino still leans heavily on his core veterans.

The kids will get their chances. They just won’t get the keys overnight.

The U.S. learned that lesson the hard way and the successful way. After the failure of 2018, the program ripped up the old script, moved on from a wave of veterans, and built around a new generation. It worked on the field; those kids became the spine of the USMNT. But it left a lingering question: what wisdom disappeared when the old guard walked out?

This time, there will be no mass clear-out. Some veterans will go. Others will stay and guide. The process will be slower, more deliberate.

“I'd say it's a continuation of the last two cycles I've been a part of, just because I just know that's how it works,” USMNT star Chris Richards told GOAL. “It's not like you just completely sack off the team that was at the World Cup and move on from there.”

Richards feels that balance every day at Crystal Palace, where Gozo is now the hungry kid chasing what he already has. Watching Gozo fight for that first cap has given the whole thing a new edge for him, a reminder of how much that first call means.

Pochettino is banking on players like Richards to set the standard for those coming through. Veterans as tone-setters, not just placeholders.

“We cannot bring a whole squad of young players, no, because they need to have some guys with experience already competing,” he said. “Yes, we are going to do a mix. Our idea is we are going to do a mix between experienced players… I think experienced players and young players can fit together and start to work and see how the young kids start to manage the pressure to play in the first team in some really nice games.”

To Pochettino, the real scouting report lives in the details. Not just the highlight reels or the numbers on a stat sheet.

“It's important not only to see them or watch the games, the performance, but also what they are talking about in the media, how they behave with the opponent, how they behave with their teammates,” he said. “I think it's so important. We want to be a very good team. We want to build something different and be competitive.”

So he watches. When they arrive at training. How long they stay after. How they speak to staff. Where their focus goes when the cameras are off. For players dreaming of that phone call, his warning is clear: everything counts.

At club level, he could ease a youngster in, see them daily, feel the moment when they were ready. International football doesn’t offer that luxury. Camps are short. Gaps are long. A teenager who looks raw in September might look like a star in March.

He knows the next squad list, due in a few weeks, is more than a roll call. It’s the first sketch of a 2030 project. Teenagers like Sullivan and Gozo are knocking. Veterans are still banging the drum. Somewhere in the middle, Pochettino has to find the blend and decide when promise becomes responsibility.

“We need to create a group of players that are really being professional and competing in the way that we expect,” he said. “They all need to compete with the talented players and young players that we have ahead.”

The future is already in the room. The question now is who gets told, and when, that their future starts now.