Over the course of its 14 World Cup qualifying matches, the United States men's national team scored 20 goals. Of those 20, a whopping four were scored by a center-forward. Put another way: American defenders scored as many goals in the Octagonal as American strikers did.
This is the blessing and the curse of international soccer: You don't get to pick which players develop into which positions; it just happens, because familial geography is destiny. Got two world-class keepers in Jan Oblak and Samir Handanovic? Tough luck, Slovenia. That's a pretty nice Mohamed Salah you got there, Egypt; would be a shame if you never developed any players who could pass him the ball, wouldn't it? Even the greatest national team of the 21st century struggled with this to a lesser degree. At Euro 2012, Spain had more midfielders than they knew what to do with but no strikers, so they just started one of them as a striker. Then, to fill the void, they convinced Brazil-born Diego Costa to play for La Roja instead of O Seleção -- and it all blew up in their face in 2014.
The USMNT, then, is experiencing a sort of C-list version of the Spain problem. There are competent players all across the roster, and even a bunch of stars playing for the best club teams in the world. There's just no one to, you know, kick the ball into the goal.
So, with seven months to go until the World Cup, let's check in with all of the potential striker options. We'll go in order of minutes played in qualifying, then minutes played in the Gold Cup, and then look at the handful of options who didn't appear in either competition.
Brace yourselves.
