The real reason MLS just set a new World Cup record with 44 players | OneFootball

A few years back, the MLS was seen as a league for veterans to retire and play what everyone saw as amateur soccer.

However, time has passed, and with the arrival of stars like Lionel Messi, Heung-Min Son, and Marco Reus, among others, the world started to pay attention to the US league’s power.

Now, the 2026 FIFA World Cup is around the corner, and many national squads are made up of players from MLS clubs, marking a turning point for the league and its development.

Because this international tournament call-outs became a milestone in MLS history.

MLS sets World Cup record with 44 players called up

The significance lies not only in the fact that 44 footballers from the MLS will represent their national teams, but also in how this milestone marks Major League Soccer's transformation from a so-called retirement league into a truly competitive one.

To put you in context, with this news, the US league surpasses the Liga MX and becomes the league with the most players in the Western Hemisphere.

This includes the Brasileirão, the Argentinian league, and any other league in the Western hemisphere. Still, the good news doesn’t stop there, with this record, MLS also becomes the second-most outside of the top five European leagues.

LAFC becomes the most World Cup call-ups, with Mathieu Choinière, Jacob Shaffelburg, Stephen Eustáquio, and Heung-Min Son.

Seventeen different countries are represented across six continents, and MLS players appear in 11 out of the 12 FIFA World Cup 2026 groups.

More importantly, this moment could mark a turning point for the league’s reputation as a genuine developer of talent, with 42 current or former players having come up through the MLS player pathway.

The truth is that with time, Major League Soccer will compete on any worldwide stage, and nobody will be surprised as we are now.