Gio Reyna won't play for USMNT until 2025 after latest injury setback

By Doug McIntyre
Published

It looks like Gio Reyna won't play for the U.S. men’s national team again this year. 

The oft-injured 21-year-old Borussia Dortmund attacker has been sidelined since injuring his left groin while training with the USMNT last month. He missed both of the Americans’ September friendlies — a loss to Canada and a tie with New Zealand — to return to Dortmund, but has not featured for the Bundesliga titan since. On Friday, Black & Yellow coach Nuri Şahin said that Reyna and two other injured players, forwards Karim Adeyemi and Julien Duranville, wouldn’t be available for selection for another six weeks.

"We expect that Juju and Karim will be available again after the international break in November. Unfortunately, Gio had a setback, and it looks similar for him," Sahin said ahead of Saturday’s visit to Union Berlin.

Reyna was not included on new U.S. coach Mauricio Pochettino’s 25-man roster for next week’s exhibition against Panama in Austin, Texas and another at Mexico on Oct. 15. The Americans then play a pair of Concacaf Nations League matches in mid-November, the squad’s final two games of 2024.

If the timeline Sahin laid out for Reyna’s return is accurate, the next opportunity for the playmaker to represent his country wouldn’t arrive until March.

Reyna logged less than 800 minutes of action during the 2023-24 season, which he split between Dortmund and Nottingham Forest. After recovering from a leg fracture, the youngster spent the second half of the campaign on loan to the Premier League side but barely played as the club narrowly staved off relegation to England's second tier. 

He made one Bundesliga appearance this term before getting hurt, coming off the bench for the final nine minutes of Dortmund’s 2024-25-opening win over Eintracht Frankfurt on Aug. 24. 

Reyna, the son of former U.S. World Cup captain Claudio Reyna and U.S. women's national team winger Danielle Egan, has eight goals in 31 international caps since making his senior debut in 2020.

Doug McIntyre is a soccer reporter for FOX Sports. A former staff writer with ESPN and Yahoo Sports, he has covered U.S. men's and women's national teams at FIFA World Cups on five continents. Follow him @ByDougMcIntyre.