USMNT: Top 3 right-backs for 2022 World Cup qualifying
2. DeAndre Yedlin
The only other USMNT right-back playing in a high-level European league is DeAndre Yedlin. Still only 26, Yedlin has amassed 26 caps across his career. Just entering his prime years, you would expect a semi-regular in mid-table Premier League team to be a shoe-in starter for the USMNT.
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Yedlin has played 99 Premier League matches in his career. He has 110 appearances for Newcastle United in all competitions and has made 15 appearances for the Magpies this season. For a USMNT player, he is competing at a very high level. But while he may be starting semi-regularly for Newcastle, — he actually has only started one of the last eight league games, though three were missed due to injury — his best position is increasingly an offensive one.
Because of Yedlin’s defensive vulnerabilities, as well as the system that Rafa Benitez so brilliantly instilled in his team last season, Steve Bruce has continued to use a back-three-based shape with wing-backs. Yedlin suits the right wing-back role superbly, his speed and athleticism allowing him to endlessly bound up and down the flank while his defensive shortcomings are shielded.
But Berhalter wants to play with a back four. Even more pertinently, he wants a defensively sound right-back who is neat and tidy in possession. That does not suit Yedlin’s style whatsoever. He will likely be a part of the squad and could still force his way into the starting XI, but for now, Berhalter and Yedlin do not fit one another.