{"id":21372,"date":"2026-02-22T01:03:55","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T01:03:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/?p=21372"},"modified":"2026-02-22T01:03:58","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T01:03:58","slug":"is-james-rodriguez-playing-tonight-for-minnesota-united-vs-austin-fc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/?p=21372","title":{"rendered":"Is James Rodriguez Playing Tonight for Minnesota United vs. Austin FC?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>Minnesota United will play their first game of the 2026 MLS season against Austin FC in Austin, Texas. Minnesota United will look to best their season last year after finishing 4th in the Western Conference.<\/p>\n<p>Minnesota United were eliminated in the Western Conference semifinals after losing 1-0 to San Diego FC.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>The club plans to have a better season, especially after making a big signing in James Rodriguez.<\/p>\n<p>The Colombian star arrives to the MLS club as a free agent and signed a six-month contract, with an option to extend it.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"content-figure\">\n<div class=\"content-image\"><\/div><figcaption class=\"fig-caption\">\n<div style=\"max-height:none;overflow:visible\">Colombian footballer James Rodriguez poses as he is presented as new player of Minnesota United FC on February 06, 2026 in Golden Valley, Minnesota. (Photo by Minnesota United FC\/MLS via Getty Images)Photo by Minnesota United FC&amp;sol;MLS via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"caption-credit\"> (Photo by Minnesota United FC&amp;sol;MLS via Getty Images)<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>There are high expectations for Rodriguez to make an impact with Minnesota United, as the 2026 World Cup gets closer and the Colombian star needs minutes to prepare for the summer.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the exciting signing for Minnesota United, James Rodriguez&#8217;s debut for the club will not be on matchday one.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"heading\">James Rodriguez won&#8217;t play in Austin FC vs Minnesota United<\/h2>\n<p>James Rodriguez will not play in Minnesota United&#8217;s game vs Austin FC tonight. Minnesota United head coach Cameron Knowles confirmed that the Colombian star will not be a part of the squad.<\/p>\n<p>Rodriguez did not travel with the rest of the Minnesota United team to Austin, Texas.<\/p>\n<p>Cameron Knowles spoke in a press conference about James Rodriguez missing the game and said, &#8220;James Rodriguez stayed in Minnesota, where he has continued training, and we expect to integrate him into the group when we return on Monday.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>The Minnesota United head coach did not answer when Rodriguez will make his debut for the club after saying, &#8220;It\u2019s difficult to put a specific timeline on his debut because we haven\u2019t seen him in a full week of training.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><i>This story was originally published by <a href=\"https:\/\/athlonsports.com\/soccer\/mls\/is-james-rodriguez-playing-tonight-for-minnesota-united-vs-austin-fc\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Athlon Sports;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Athlon Sports<\/a> on Feb 21, 2026, where it first appeared in the <a href=\"https:\/\/athlonsports.com\/soccer\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Soccer;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Soccer<\/a> section. Add Athlon Sports as a <a href=\"https:\/\/google.com\/preferences\/source?q=athlonsports.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Preferred Source by clicking here.;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/articles\/james-rodriguez-playing-tonight-minnesota-212300856.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Minnesota United will play their first game of the 2026 MLS season against Austin FC in Austin, Texas. Minnesota United will look to best their season last year after finishing 4th in the Western Conference. Minnesota United were eliminated in the Western Conference semifinals after losing 1-0 to San Diego FC. Advertisement The club plans &#8230; <a title=\"Is James Rodriguez Playing Tonight for Minnesota United vs. Austin FC?\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/?p=21372\" aria-label=\"Read more about Is James Rodriguez Playing Tonight for Minnesota United vs. Austin FC?\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21373,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21372","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Is-James-Rodriguez-Playing-Tonight-for-Minnesota-United-vs-Austin.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21372"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21372\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21374,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21372\/revisions\/21374"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}