FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. — Brenden Aaronson walked into Mauricio Pochettino’s office in March ready to move the most important day of his life.
His wedding to Milana D’Ambra, Aaronson’s high school sweetheart, had been on the books for May 30 for about 2 ½ years, the USMNT midfielder said Tuesday.
The original schedule he’d gotten for the lead-up to the World Cup, he thinks before Pochettino was even hired in September 2024, had June 1 as the date for the team to report to camp. So, no problem.
Then, with just a few months to go, the schedule changed.
The USMNT was now scheduled to play its first sendoff friendly on May 31. It would report to camp on May 26.
“I think it was around December, probably Christmastime, when you get those friendly schedules and when you learn that we were gonna be reporting — when she learned we were gonna be reporting at that time, her reaction, her face flushed,” Aaronson said. “My face flushed. We were kind of freaking out.
“You put so much time and effort. She put so much time and effort, let’s be honest, doing the wedding, and it was really scary.”
Weddings aren’t easy to move around in a few months’ notice, but Aaronson was willing to try if that was what Pochettino wanted. He waited until the March window, when he could speak to the manager in person, and laid out the situation.
Thankfully, Pochettino was on board with giving Aaronson a day off training to travel to Manahawkin, N.J., for his nuptials.
So, on Friday, Aaronson trained with the USMNT, then booked it to the airport. He got to his own rehearsal dinner at 7:30 p.m. — 90 minutes late — after going straight from the plane. His wedding was the next day, then on Sunday, it was a 2:30 a.m. alarm to drive to Philadelphia and catch another flight back to Atlanta to resume training.
That came on the heels of an already insane travel schedule: Aaronson had gone from London to Leeds to Manchester to New York to Atlanta — all since the prior Sunday — and then traveled with the USMNT to Charlotte, N.C., for its game against Senegal after Saturday’s training.
“I told him I’m completely OK with moving my wedding. I can move it, I’ll do whatever I can to be on the roster,” Aaronson said. “Milana gets a lot of credit. It’s not easy to be leaving on a wedding night. She’s been with me since the beginning. She knows how many days we’ve been through doing all the football stuff. For her to be as cool as she is, it’s amazing.”
It probably helped that D’Ambra, who met Aaronson at a mutual friend’s Sweet 16 birthday party, had a soccer career of her own, playing at Temple. Her father, Don D’Ambra, also coached the men’s team at St. Joe’s for 14 years.
Aaronson also comes from a soccer family, with a brother, Paxten, who plays for the Colorado Rapids, a sister, Jaden, who currently plays for Villanova and a father, Rusty, who is the sporting director of Real Futbol Academy in Medford, N.J.
So there was plenty of understanding all around that this constituted a unique situation, as Aaronson found out he was on the World Cup roster the same week as his wedding.
“That was probably the most nervous I’ve ever been in my life,” Aaronson said of waiting for the WhatsApp message that informed him he would be a part of a second straight World Cup. “To finally get that text and then the first thing I think about is, OK, now I gotta fly in. You’re trying to do it all in your brain: what’s gonna happen, this, that, so you’re nervous about all these things and the logistics of it all.
“I think the first thing that came to mind was how proud I was to be on this roster. As time went on, I was able to focus on the wedding a little bit more, kinda think about how amazing that day is gonna be.”
Indeed, despite the situation, the day was everything Aaronson wanted it to be.
“I’m just grateful for the experience and to be able to do that,” he said. “It’s not really normal. I’m really grateful that I was able to and now I’m just ready to get ready for this World Cup. It’s an exciting time.”
