U.S. men’s soccer World Cup hopeful Noahkai Banks is taking the slow and steady approach
Though there’s no guarantee that he’ll make U.S. head coach Mauricio Pochettino's tournament squad, Banks should be squarely on the list of names you’d want to know before the World Cup. Here's why.
As the clock ticks toward the World Cup, the buzz continues to grow around 19-year-old U.S. national team centerback prospect Noahkai Banks.
Though there’s no guarantee yet that he’ll make the tournament squad, the attention is warranted. He has played in 16 of the last 17 games for his club, FC Augsburg of Germany’s Bundesliga, and has often looked good on the field.
That puts Banks squarely on the list of names you’d want to know before the World Cup, and certainly before the U.S. team’s last auditions in March.
He knows it, as he said when he spoke with The Inquirer earlier in the season. This week brought another opportunity to get to know him, as the Bundesliga hosted a roundtable with Banks for U.S. media.
There was much to talk about, starting with his reflections on his one U.S. team camp so far last fall.
“I was pretty nervous when I got into camp because I was 18 years old at the moment,” said Banks, who turned 19 on Dec. 1. “So I thought maybe the older guys will think, ‘Who’s that, or what is he doing here?’”
In fact, the opposite happened.
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“For example, Tim Ream, the first day in training, he helped me a lot, because he plays in my position,” Banks said of the fellow centerback and frequent U.S. captain. “He has coached me a lot, and helped me to get into the training and into the new tactics — because obviously, it was a big jump. But also, the older guys also had dinner and they said ‘Come, sit at our table.”
Little things like that are a great sign of the strong spirit in the American program.
“Players like [Christian] Pulisic, [Tim] Weah, they helped me a lot,” Banks said, naming two of the Americans’ biggest stars. Of others, he said, “how they welcomed me, how they made my life easy, was very cool to be honest.”
It was no surprise that he praised manager Mauricio Pochettino, but how he did so was news.
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“He has been a centerback back in the day [as a player], he knows the position very well, and he’s helped me with small details like positioning and stuff like this,” Banks said. “Just the small things which make a difference at the highest level. He gave me some tips, and I hope I can do what he told me in the future.”
‘Happy with the U.S.’ and ‘grounded’ at home
National team staff has remained in touch with him since then, further raising the odds of a March call-up. But because he hasn’t formally committed to the senior U.S. team yet, the Hawai’i native can still switch allegiance to Germany, where he has lived since age 10.
“I’ve been in touch with Germany before, to be honest,” Banks said, but he “was always very happy with the U.S. You can’t tell what happens in the future, but at the moment, there’s not a thought of switching or something like this, because I’m happy with the U.S.”
That happiness dates back to playing for various U.S. youth teams, including at the 2023 under-17 World Cup.
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“One of the best experiences in my life,” he said. “And then also at [the] u-19 and u-20 level, I was always just very happy to get into camp to see my friends again, because we were a big class of friends. It was not like I [would] go to the national team and play football, it was like I meet my friends and play football with them.”
Banks does not lack for confidence, but he carries it well.
“To be honest, I was always very confident — I think I have that from my mom,” he said. “So I always believed in myself, and I always believed I can play in the Bundesliga. But I think, also, confidence grows and builds itself up with time and with games.”
Those games have earned the trust of Augsburg’s coaching staff, a feat made harder by two managerial changes since last summer. The club has been fighting all season to avoid relegation. It’s currently 13th in the 18-team league, but just three standings points into safety.
“It has been a great year so far, because I didn’t expect to play that much, to be absolutely honest with you,” Banks said. “But yeah, the coaches have given me a lot of trust, a lot of minutes. So [over] time, as I said before, I got more confident with the team, with my teammates, with the players, with the tactics.”
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Family matters a lot to him, too. He is close with his mother Nadine, whose own athletic genes earned her a shot at college basketball before repeat tears to her ACL derailed it. She moved Banks to Germany after separating from his father, settling in a Bavarian mountain town just over an hour from Augsburg.
“I think it’s easy to stay grounded, because I have a great family behind me,” the son said. “And also the club doesn’t allow [otherwise], because my teammates are all very grounded and very humble. It’s like a big family here.”
Then he added a flourish that far-away Philadelphia would appreciate: “Also, my mom would kick my [butt] if I’m not grounded anymore, so there’s no chance of that.”
Nor is there a chance of Banks looking too far ahead — as in, to the World Cup — before Augsburg’s season is settled.
“As I said a lot of times before, I think it’s not the right moment to think about the World Cup for me, because we have a lot of games left here,” he said. “So really just focus. A lot of players say it, but I really mean it: I really just focus on the games we have here. And yeah, then let’s see what happens in summer.”