sport news Alexi Lalas is 'p***** off' by Haji Wright's call up on USMNT World Cup roster trends now
Former USMNT star turned soccer pundit, Alexi Lalas, was not happy to say the least when he first read Haji Wright's name in the Star and Stripes' 26-man roster for the World Cup.
Appearing on Fox Soccer's coverage of Gregg Berhalter's list on Wednesday, Lalas didn't hold back on the head coach's choice to select Wright above the likes of Ricardo Pepi, Jordan Pefok and Brandon Vazquez.
'The big, big question, the main talking point is...who is it? Haji Wright!,' the former MLS defender with 96 caps and 10 goals for his country said in disbelief. 'Haji Wrong...'
'Are you kidding me?! Are you kidding me?! Haji Wright! See, this is the one that gets me p***ed off. I do not understand how Haji Wright is going to the World Cup over Pepi, over Pefok,' Lalas added.
Haji Wright, who has scored nine times in 12 games in Turkey, is a surprise call up to the USMNT
He then leans into Fox Sports researcher, David Mosse, and tells him: 'When we were putting together our list of potentials...'
'We did a segment debating who the strikers would be and we listed all the possibilities. We debated whether to include Haji Wright on that list of possible callups because, frankly, you know, Berhalter, he played him in that El Salvador slop game in the Nations League and he struggled there,' Mosse said.
'And then [Berhalter] absolutely ripped him afterwards and left him out of the September window. So I'll be honest, I'm shocked,' he added. 'I thought he was out of the picture.'
'But what was interesting is, and we talked about this a lot on the pod, is early on this season, there was this narrative that ''how could you not call up Pefok with the
