Background and career
Christian Mate Pulisic (born September 18, 1998) is an American professional soccer player who plays as a winger, attacking midfielder, or forward for Serie A club AC Milan and the United States national team. Regarded as one of the best North American players of all time, he is nicknamed "Captain America" and known for his dribbling, directness, and playmaking. He is both the all-time American top goalscorer and assist provider in the European top five leagues and the UEFA Champions League. Born and raised in Hershey, Pennsylvania, Pulisic began his professional career at Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund, where he progressed quickly through the team's youth academy, featuring in only 15 youth games while scoring 10 and assisting 8. After being promoted to the senior team in January 2016 at age 17, he became the then-youngest player to score multiple goals in Bundesliga history. His involvement began increasing in the following 2016–17 season, where he was a mainstay in the Dortmund team that won the DFB-Pokal. His performances made him runner-up of the 2018 Kopa Trophy, presented to the world's best player under the age of 21. In January 2019, Pulisic moved to Premier League club Chelsea in a transfer worth $73 million (£57.6 million), making him the most expensive North American player of all time, and began playing for the club in the 2019–20 season. He won the 2020–21 UEFA Champions League, where he became the first American to play in a Champions League final. In the 2021–22 season, he won the 2021 UEFA Super Cup and 2021 FIFA Club World Cup. Pulisic moved to Serie A club AC Milan in June 2023 and won the 2024–25 Supercoppa Italiana. Pulisic played for the United States at under-15 and under-17 levels, before making his senior national team debut in March 2016 at age 17. He became the youngest player ever to captain the United States national team at age 20. Pulisic was named best young player of the 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup. He won the CONCACAF Nations League in 2021, 2023 and 2024, winning the best player award of the 2023 tournament. Individually, he is tied with Landon Donovan for the record of four U.S. Player of the Year awards and has been widely viewed as the "face" of men's American soccer.
Pulisic was born in Hershey, Pennsylvania, where he spent the majority of his childhood. Pulisic's paternal grandfather, Mate Pulišić, was born on the Croatian island of Olib. His paternal grandmother Johanna DiStefano was Sicilian. Pulisic obtained Croatian citizenship later in his early adulthood. His parents, Kelley and Mark Pulisic, both played collegiate soccer at George Mason University and his father also played professional indoor soccer for the Harrisburg Heat in the 1990s and later became a coach at the youth, collegiate, and professional levels. Growing up, his soccer idol was Luís Figo. While his mother was on a teacher exchange in England through the Fulbright Program, Pulisic lived for a year in Tackley, Oxfordshire. At age seven, he began playing for the youth team of Brackley Town. When his father was general manager of indoor club Detroit Ignition in the mid-2000s, Pulisic lived in Michigan and played for Michigan Rush. While in Michigan, he attended Workman Elementary School.
After the family returned to the Hershey area, Pulisic grew up playing for local U.S. Soccer Development Academy club PA Classics and occasionally training with local professional club Harrisburg City Islanders, later known as the now-defunct Penn FC, during his teen years. In the summer of 2010, he went on a five-day trial at Chelsea's Cobham base.
Pulisic moved to Germany before his 16th birthday, eligible for European residency through Croatian nationality law, which allowed him to secure a Croatian passport through familial heritage. In February 2015, Borussia Dortmund signed 16-year-old Pulisic and assigned him first to their U17 squad, winning the Under 17 Bundesliga in 2014–15. He was immediately promoted in summer 2015 to the U19 squad and won the Under 19 Bundesliga for the 2015–16 season. After scoring 10 goals and assisting 8 in just 15 games with the Dortmund youth teams, Pulisic was called to join the first team over winter break.
In January 2016, while with the first team in the winter break, Pulisic played the second half of two friendly matches, scoring one goal and assisting another. On January 24, a day after making his debut on the first team bench, Pulisic played 90 minutes in a friendly against Union Berlin, scoring a goal and assisting another. He made his Bundesliga debut in a 2–0 win against Ingolstadt on January 30, 2016, coming on as a second-half substitute for Adrián Ramos. On February 18, Pulisic made his UEFA Europa League debut as a second-half substitute in a 2–0 victory against Porto. Pulisic made his first Bundesliga start on February 21, against Bayer Leverkusen, before eventually being substituted for Marco Reus. He made his second Bundesliga start on April 10, against Schalke 04 in the Revierderby, playing 73 minutes before being replaced by İlkay Gündoğan. In response to Pulisic's performance against Schalke, team manager Thomas Tuchel said, "He's a teenager in his first year of professional football. His first two games in the starting eleven were in Leverkusen and here today in Schalke – not the easiest of tasks. It shows our huge appreciation that we see him as a full time player on our team. He was a valuable substitute against Werder Bremen and Liverpool. He has looked really good recently which has been proved today. It is completely normal that he could not have played with this pace and this intensity for over 90 minutes." Pulisic scored his first Bundesliga goal for Borussia Dortmund on April 17, opening the scoring in a 3–0 home win against Hamburg. It made him the youngest non-German and fourth-youngest player to score a goal in the Bundesliga, at 17 years and 212 days old. With his goal against VfB Stuttgart on April 23, Pulisic broke another Bundesliga scoring record by becoming the youngest player to score two goals in the top-flight league. The game also marked his first yellow card in the Bundesliga, as a result of a challenge on Emiliano Insúa.
In the 2016 International Champions Cup friendly pre-season tournament, Pulisic scored in stoppage time against Manchester City to send the clubs into penalties. During his first competitive appearance in his second year with the club, Pulisic became Dortmund's youngest player ever to play in the UEFA Champions League. The following weekend he scored his first goal of the season and provided two assists in a 6–0 victory against Darmstadt 98, one day before his 18th birthday. In a September Champions League group stage game against Real Madrid, with Dortmund trailing 2–1, Pulisic came on as a second-half substitute and helped set up André Schürrle's late goal, allowing Dortmund to earn a 2–2 draw. In a substitute appearance on October 22, Pulisic assisted one goal and scored the equalizer against Ingolstadt 04, who were last place at the beginning of the day, to salvage a draw, coming back from 3–1 down. On January 23, 2017, Pulisic signed a new deal with Dortmund which would keep him at the club until 2020. On March 8, 2017, Pulisic scored his first UEFA Champions League goal in a 4–0 victory over Benfica in the round of 16, making him Dortmund's youngest ever scorer in the competition at the age of 18 years, 5 months, and 18 days. He was a victim of the Borussia Dortmund team bus bombing in April 2017, and was among his teammates who testified in 2019. Pulisic assisted one of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang's goals in the win, advancing Dortmund to the quarter-finals. On August 5, 2017, Pulisic scored the first goal in the DFL-Supercup against Bayern Munich. Pulisic was on the final shortlist of the 2017 Golden Boy award, finishing 6th. In the following year, he was nominated final shortlist of the inaugural Kopa Trophy, finishing runner-up to Kylian Mbappé during the 2018 ceremony.
