US trains for World Cup at new $250 million, 200-acre, 19-field complex south of Atlanta

FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. (AP) — Jozy Altidore arrived at the new U.S. Soccer National Training Center, a $250 million, 200-acre, 19-field complex south of Atlanta, far different from where his 2014 American team recovered from practice in a plastic cold tub on a paved path outside Stanford’s Cagan Stadium in California.

“This is the culmination, right?” the retired striker said Thursday. “This is what I’m sure past players strived to want to be a part of.”

As the Americans prepare to host the World Cup next month, the national team programs have progressed light years. Sunil Gulati, who would later become U.S. Soccer Federation president, recalled buying balls from a Kmart on the morning of an intrasquad game at Colorado Springs, Colorado, filled with players trying to earn spots for the U.S. roster going to the 1985 FIFA Under-16 World Championship. And then sprinklers went off during the match.

Facilities kept improving ever so slightly. The Americans based ahead of the 1994 World Cup at a $3.5 million, seven-acre facility opened the previous year in Mission Viejo, California. They switched to a training center in Chula Vista, California, for 1998, then trained in Cary, North Carolina, in 2002 and 2006. The team moved to Princeton in 2010 and Stanford in 2014.

In recent years, national team practices took place at Major League Soccer training facilities. The new training center, opened May 7, was funded with a $50 million lead gift from Atlanta Falcons and MLS team owner Arthur Bank. It was built on a former cow pasture about 25 miles from Atlanta and is home to all 27 U.S. national teams.

“It's nice to have the first rights of everything that you want to do here,” said midfielder Tyler Adams, the American captain at the 2022 World Cup. “Whenever you train at an MLS facility or something like that, it’s their facility. You’re a guest.”

There are 13 full-size grass fields on three levels, two more with artificial turf, two with sand for beach soccer and two indoors. The USSF moved its office from Chicago to the center, which includes 20 locker rooms, 19 meeting rooms, a 10,000-square foot gym and a kitchen with adjacent dining area.

Offices are on the second floor, some overlooking the most prominent fields, such as the one the World Cup team trained on.

“From my office, you can see the grass. It’s the first time I’ve ever been excited to see grass grow,” USSF CEO JT Batson said.

The USSF examined examples around the world, such as England's St. Georges Park and the French national team training center at Clairefontaine.

Players are staying at a hotel in nearby Trilith. The area has grown rapidly after the opening of Trilith Studios, a movie and television production complex where Marvel Studios films are made.

Defender Chris Richards will be the last to arrive, on Friday, after remaining with Crystal Palace for the UEFA Conference League final in Germany on Wednesday.

World Cup-bound players watched the women's under-16 team train Wednesday.

“They can see the first team and how they move and how the operate and that’s the goal of where they want to end up,” Adams said. “As a youth national team player, if I could have ever had the opportunity to be even close to the senior team, that would have been really special because that’s your dream.”

AP World Cup: https://apnews.com/hub/fifa-world-cup

U.S. Soccer Federation CEO JT Batson answers questions from the media at the national training complex, Thursday, May 28, 2026, in Fayetteville, Ga., about the possibility of U.S. coach Mauricio Pochettino discussing taking a job with Italian club AC Milan. (AP Photo/Ronald Blum

United States coach Mauricio Pochettino speaks with the media at the national training complex, Thursday, May 28, 2026, in Fayetteville, Ga., ahead of the FIFA World Cup soccer tournament. (AP Photo/Ronald Blum

United States soccer players work on a drill at the new national training complex, Thursday, May 28, 2026, in Fayetteville, Ga., ahead of the 2026 World Cup soccer tournament. (AP Photo/Ronald Blum

MOSCOW (AP) — Members of a Russia-led economic alliance on Friday warned member Armenia that it could face suspension over its aspirations to join the European Union as tensions continued to simmer between the Kremlin and the Armenian leadership.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and leaders of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, who attended a summit of the Eurasian Economic Union in Kazakhstan's capital of Astana, noted that Armenia's bid for the EU membership creates “significant risks” for their economic security. They ordered their officials to prepare a report in December on “possible consequences of suspending” Armenia's membership in the grouping.

The four leaders also urged Armenia to hold a referendum to offer voters a choice between seeking a membership in the EU or staying in the Eurasian Economic Union, a single market created in 2015 to allow the free movement of goods, capitals and labor. Armenia's Prime Ministe r Nikol Pashinyan has previously rejected the idea of holding the vote.

The warning comes just over a week before Armenia's parliamentary elections on June 7, in which Pashinyan, in power since 2018, seeks to retain his job.

Armenia, which signed a U.S.-brokered agreement last year ending decades of hostilities with Azerbaijan, has increasingly sought to forge closer ties with the U.S. and the EU. Pashinyan has declared an intention to join the EU and his government has suspended the country’s participation in a Moscow-dominated security pact, the Collective Security Treaty Organization.

Armenia's westward shift has angered the Kremlin. Putin has warned Pashinyan that his country would suffer massive economic damage if it pursues its EU aspirations. In recent days, Moscow warned Armenia that it could stop supplies of cheap natural gas and banned imports of Armenian brandy, fruit and vegetables, part of the Kremlin's efforts to sway the outcome of Armenia's election.

Putin has said Armenia can't be a member of both the EU and the Eurasian Economic Union. He warned Friday that Armenia could lose up to 14% of its Gross Domestic Product if it opts out of the Moscow-dominated bloc.

Pashinyan has countered Putin's warnings by arguing that for now Armenia can combine its membership in the Eurasian Economic Union with developing cooperation with the EU.

Speaking Friday, Putin also compared the current arguments with Armenia to the developments in Ukraine, whose bid to sign an association deal with the EU led to the ouster of its Moscow-friendly president, Russia's annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014 and Moscow's support for a separatist insurgency in eastern Ukraine that erupted the same year. In February 2022, Putin sent troops into Ukraine, staring the largest military conflict in Europe since World War II.

Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a news conference after the Supreme Eurasian Economic Union summit in Astana, Kazakhstan, Friday, May 29, 2026. (Alexander Shcherbak/Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)

A view of the session of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council summit at the Independence Palace in Astana, Kazakhstan, Friday, May 29, 2026. (Alexander Kazakov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)

Front from left: Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Kazakhstan's President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, and Kyrgyztan's President Sadyr Zhaparov attend a plenary session of the Eurasian Economic Forum in Astana, Kazakhstan, Thursday, May 28, 2026. (Alexander Kazakov/Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)