KINGSTON, Jamaica — Bruce Arena’s second tenure as U.S. men’s national team coach obviously didn’t end well, but that didn’t detract from the value of the counsel he offered Gregg Berhalter when the latter took over the rebuilding program in late 2018. Arena had managed multiple generations of internationals through three World Cup cycles. He understood the peculiarities of the gig.
“He was like, ‘Gregg, you’re not going to have these players available all the time. Something always comes up.’ And I think it’s better that we can accept that and then build the team based on that, and have the collective buy-in that guys know that they can contribute,” Berhalter said here in the Jamaican capital on Monday afternoon.