The U.S. Men’s National Team will contest its first competitive matches under coach Mauricio Pochettino as it faces Jamaica in a two-leg, Concacaf Nations League quarterfinal series on Nov. 14 and Nov. 18.
The opener at the National Stadium in Kingston, Jamaica, begins at 8 p.m. ET. The rematch takes place four days later at CITYPARK in St. Louis, Mo. Kickoff in the Gateway City is at 8 p.m. ET and tickets are available here. Both games will be broadcast by TNT, TruTV, Universo, Max, Peacock and Fútbol de Primera Radio.
With qualification already ensured for a home World Cup that’s less than two years away, competitive opportunities are at a premium for the USMNT and there’s plenty at stake this month. A triumph in the aggregate goals series against Jamaica would send the Americans to the Nations League final four next March in Inglewood, Calif., where they would have an opportunity to win the competition for a fourth consecutive time.
Crucially, beating Jamaica would also confirm the USA’s place at the 2025 Concacaf Gold Cup. The biennial 16-team confederation championship, scheduled next summer for 14 venues in the U.S. and Canada, represents the final chance to play competitive matches before the World Cup. If the Americans fall to the Reggae Boyz this month, they’ll miss out on the 2025 Nations League finals and face a do-or-die Gold Cup playoff instead.
With those stakes in mind, here are five things to know about Jamaica.
SOCCER IN JAMAICA
Although the Reggae Boyz haven’t returned to the global stage since their stirring qualification for the 1998 FIFA World Cup in France (where they beat Japan in the group stage finale), they’ve cemented themselves as the premier side in the Caribbean and a consistent Concacaf contender.
Currently ranked 61st by FIFA (good for sixth in Concacaf), Jamaica was in the 40s from October 2019 through May 2021 and reached consecutive Gold Cup title games in 2015 and 2017. After losing the first to Mexico and the second to the USA, Jamaica rebounded to make the Gold Cup semis in 2019 and 2023. Jamaica was the only Caribbean team to advance to the final round of Concacaf’s World Cup qualifying competition during the 2014 and 2022 cycles. It also qualified for this year’s Nations League final four (where it claimed bronze), and then the Copa América.
Highlighted by its 1998 World Cup appearance and the 2015 and 2017 Gold Cup silver medals, Jamaica’s honors list also includes six successes in the now-defunct Caribbean Cup (1991, 1998, 2005, 2008, 2010 and 2014).
Not only has Jamaica furnished a host of noteworthy players to Major League Soccer, it’s also committed to bolstering the national team through the diaspora in the UK. Fourteen of the 25 men on Jamaica’s 2024 Copa América squad were born in England, including the likes of West Ham United’s Michail Antonio and Fulham’s Bobby De Cordova-Reid (now at Leicester City).
Fans in the USA will be familiar with MLS Best XI honorees Andre Blake—the Reggae Boyz current captain and Philadelphia Union stalwart—as well as fellow goalkeeper Donovan Ricketts and defender Kemar Lawrence. Only six countries, including the USA and Canada, have produced more individual MLS Best XI placements than the Jamaican trio’s combined six. In addition, forward Dane Kelly, who’s been capped by Jamaica three times and scored twice, is the USL Championship’s all-time leading marksman.
Jamaica’s all-time leading international goal scorer remains the late Luton Shelton, who struck 35 times in 75 appearances from 2004 through 2013. The leading active scorer is Shamar Nicholson. The Spartak Moscow forward has 54 caps and 19 goals (two against the USA).
USMNT HISTORY VS. JAMAICA
Although the USMNT has dominated the all-time series between the countries, posting a 20W-3L-10D record dating back the first meeting in 1988, the Reggae Boyz have proven to be a tough out in recent years.
The USA has been tested repeatedly by Jamaica in official competition over the past decade, from the 2-1 2015 Concacaf Gold Cup semifinal defeat in Atlanta and the nervy 1-1 draw in a November 2021 World Cup qualifier in Kingston, to this year’s Nations League semi outside Dallas. There, on March 21, the Americans needed a 96th-minute own goal to reach extra time. Haji Wright’s brace then lifted the USA to a 3-1 win and a place in the final.
The scoreboard in each of the past three matches between the sides has read 1-1 when regulation time expired. The aforementioned Kingston qualifier and a 2023 Gold Cup group-stage game in Chicago ended that way, while Wright provided the final margin in the Nations League semi.
The USA is on a 5W-0L-2D run against the Reggae Boyz since losing a friendly, 1-0, on June 5, 2019 in Washington D.C. The USA is 13W-2L-8D against Jamaica in official competition all-time and 1W-0L-0D in Nations League play.
The Americans’ record in Kingston is 3W-1L-6D, with the victories coming in friendlies played in 1994 and 2003 and a World Cup qualifier on June 7, 2013. The USA’s only win on Jamaican soil in official competition came courtesy of a first-half goal by Jozy Altidore and then, after the hosts equalized in the 89th minute, a stoppage-time strike from Seattle Sounders midfielder Brad Evans.
The USA and Jamaica have met in a two-game, aggregate goals series just once. The sides had never played each other when they were drawn to face off in the second round of Concacaf’s 1990 World Cup qualifying competition (which doubled as the 1989 confederation championship). The opener in Kingston on July 24, 1988 finished 0-0, leaving the USA needing a result in the return leg in Fenton, Mo., to progress. The Aug. 13 match at what is now World Wide Technology Soccer Park was tied, 1-1, at the hour mark, but the USA then pulled away and ran out 5-1 winners. Nearly two years later, after negotiating Concacaf’s final round, the USMNT made its modern-era World Cup debut in Italy.
The USA’s 20 wins over Jamaica are the third-most against a single opponent, behind Mexico (24) and Trinidad & Tobago (22).
JAMAICA’S RECENT FORM
Jamaica is 6W-4L-3D in 2024 and has slipped slightly from 55th to 61st in FIFA’s ranking during the year. It’s been a busy period, as the Reggae Boyz kicked off their 2026 World Cup qualifying campaign, played in the Copa América and contested both the 2023-24 Nations League finals and the 2024-25 group stage, with mixed results.
Jamaica rebounded from the overtime Nations League loss to the USA in March and claimed bronze with a 1-0 win over Panama. It rode that momentum into June and its first two World Cup qualifiers: one-goal victories over Dominican Republic and Dominica. At 2W-0L-0D, the Reggae Boyz are tied with Guatemala atop their five-team group, from which two will advance to next year’s 12-team third round.
The attack dried up at the Copa América, however, as Jamaica lost to Mexico, Ecuador and Venezuela and scored just once. Head coach Heimir Hallgrímsson resigned after almost two years on the job. Steve McLaren took over and in September and October, Jamaica went 2W-0L-2D in Nations League play, yielding just one goal in the process and finishing atop its six-team group. Notably, the two draws occurred in Kingston—goalless games against Cuba and Honduras—while the two wins came on the road.
Shamar Nicholson leads the Reggae Boyz with three goals in 2024. Michail Antonio and Kaheim Dixon have two each.
THE HEAD COACH
On July 31, Jamaica announced the surprising hire of Steve McLaren, the 63-year-old former England manager who’d never worked outside Europe (save a few months consulting in Israel in 2017) and hadn’t been a head coach since leaving Queens Park Rangers in spring 2019. He most recently worked on Erik ten Hag’s staff at Manchester United and departed Old Trafford to take the Jamaica job.
McLaren is Jamaica’s fourth European manager of the 2000s, following former USMNT coach Bora Milutinović (2006-07), Germany’s Winfried Schäfer (2013-16) and Iceland’s Hallgrímsson (former England international John Barnes, a Kingston native, also coached the Reggae Boyz in 2008-09).
McLaren initially made his name in coaching circles as an assistant to Alex Ferguson at United and has managed clubs in England, Netherlands and Germany over the past 23 years. He led his first club, Middlesbrough, to an EFL Cup title in 2004 and then a Cinderella run to the 2006 UEFA Cup final, where they lost to Sevilla. He also won the Dutch Eredivisie title with FC Twente in 2009-10. But McLaren is also connected to the English national team’s most recent qualification failure.
Hired to succeed Sven-Göran Eriksson following the 2006 World Cup, McLaren endured a rough start to his England tenure which put qualification for Euro 2008 in jeopardy. Three straight wins in the fall of 2007 lifted the Three Lions back into contention, but defeats to Russia and then Croatia—the latter a 3-2 setback at Wembley Stadium—sealed their fate. McLaren was fired, and England hasn’t missed a major tournament since.
McLaren rebounded with success at Twente and subsequently spent time coaching and/or consulting at VfL Wolfsburg, Nottingham Forest, Twente again, Derby County (three times), Newcastle United, Maccabi Tel Aviv, QPR and Manchester United.
McLaren and Pochettino opposed each other on an English sideline on Dec. 13, 2015, when McLaren’s Newcastle shocked Pochettino’s Tottenham Hotspur, 2-1, at White Hart Lane. Spurs had been on a 14-game unbeaten run in league play while Newcastle was stuck in the relegation zone. But Spanish midfielder Ayoze Pérez lifted McLaren and the Magpies to victory with a stoppage-time winner. McLaren was dismissed three months later.
THE REGGAE BOYZ ROSTER
McLaren’s 24-man roster is highlighted by the return of Aston Villa winger Leon Bailey, who hasn’t played for the Reggae Boyz since appearing in the 2023-24 Nations League quarterfinals one year ago. A falling out with Hallgrímsson and the Jamaican Football Federation prompted Bailey, 27, to withdraw from national team consideration and he missed this year’s World Cup qualifiers and Copa América. He then suffered an injury as McLaren took the reins. But Bailey is finally back in the fold. He has five goals in 30 career international matches, and also has tallied three assists in 15 appearances this season for Villa.
The squad features 12 men who play their club ball in England, led by Bailey and Michail Antonio. The English cohort also features Newcastle midfielder Isaac Hayden, an Essex native and Arsenal youth product who represented England from the U-16 through U-21 levels. Hayden, 29, has a Jamaican father and switched his international allegiance to the Reggae Boyz while being left off the Premier League roster at St. James’ Park. He spent the spring of 2024 on loan to Queens Park Rangers.
There are five Reggae Boyz who play in MLS or the USL Championship. Blake, a three-time MLS Goalkeeper of the Year, missed the June qualifiers and Copa América through injury but returned for Nations League play this fall and yielded just one goal in four games.
Nicholson, the Reggae Boyz’ leading scorer, has four goals in 11 matches for Spartak this season.
Defender Damion Lowe, the roster’s most experienced field player, will be familiar to fans in the U.S. as a former member of the Seattle Sounders, Minnesota United, Tampa Bay Rowdies, Phoenix Rising, Inter Miami and Philadelphia Union. He’s now at Al Okhdood, which is in 14th place in the Saudi Pro League.
Bobby De Cordova-Reid is a notable omission. The Leicester City winger has played nine times for Jamaica in 2024 but missed the Foxes’ past two matches with an injury.
DETAILED JAMAICA ROSTER BY POSITION
GOALKEEPERS (3): Andre Blake (Philadelphia Union/USA; 79/0), Shaquan Davis (Mount Pleasant; 1/0), Jahmali Waite (El Paso Locomotive/USA; 13/0)
DEFENDERS (9): Amari’i Bell (Luton Town/ENG; 19/1), Di’shon Bernard (Sheffield Wednesday/ENG; 18/1), Tayvon Gray (New York City FC/USA; 7/0), Mason Holgate (West Bromwich Albion/ENG; 2/0), Richard King (Cavalier; 20/0), Greg Leigh (Oxford United/ENG; 21/1), Dexter Lembikisa (Yverdon Sport/SUI; 21/1), Damion Lowe (Al Okhdood/KSA; 69/3), Ethan Pinnock (Brentford/ENG; 17/0)
MIDFIELDERS (5): Karoy Anderson (Charlton Athletic/ENG; 11/0), Isaac Hayden (Newcastle United/ENG; 0/0), Joel Latibeaudiere (Coventry City/ENG; 21/0), Tyreek Magee (Colorado Springs Switchbacks/USA; 12/0), Kasey Palmer (Hull City/ENG; 12/0)
FORWARDS (7): Michail Antonio (West Ham United/ENG; 21/5), Leon Bailey (Aston Villa/ENG; 30/5), Renaldo Cephas (Ankaragücü/TUR; 10/0), Kaheim Dixon (Charlton Athletic/ENG; 11/2), Demarai Gray (Al Ettifaq/KSA; 18/5), Shamar Nicholson (Spartak Moscow/RUS; 54/19), Romario Williams (Indy Eleven/USA; 22/4)
