This is the picture posted of the US team in a foreign (Persian) magazine prior to the 1990 World Cup that was essentially the first visual of the US team that I ever got. I can't seem to fit the lineup with any given game. If I am to believe the lineup posted it is as follows (left to right): Perez, Trittschuh, Murray, Windichmann, Banks, Vanole. Gabarra, Stollmeyer, Harkes, Bliss, Caligiuri. I'm not so sure the lineup is correct. I don't remember Perez being so dark and having a beard. The rest seem to be correct. Perhaps someone recognizes the background.
The image isn't in the highest resolution, so it's hard to make out the faces. But based on your description, I looked up lineups with all of the players listed there, with the possible exception of Hugo Perez. This is the only one I could find that matched that description. FRIENDLY INTERNATIONAL 24/06/1989, Miami, Orange Bowl, 15,233 USA 0-1 COLOMBIA USA: David Vanole, Steve Trittschuh, Mike Windischmann, Jimmy Banks, Paul Caligiuri (George Pastor 52'), John Stollmeyer (John Doyle 67'), Brian Bliss, John Harkes, Jim Gabarra (Philip Gyau 61'), Bruce Murray, Eric Eichmann However, the guy (mis?)labeled as Hugo Perez certainly doesn't look like Eric Eichman either.
It looks like the US played a series of unofficial exhibition games in something called the Marlboro Cup between 1987 and 1990, often against club sides. In the spring and summer of 1989 alone, they played games against Colombian club sides América de Cali and Independiente Santa Fe, Portuguese giants Benfica, the Peru national team, Polish club champions Ruch Chorzów, Mexico's Chivas Guadalajara, Italian Serie A giants Juventus, and the South Korean national team. I can only find the lineups for the games we played against Peru, Benfica, and South Korea in that tournament (the South Korea lineup is also close but doesn't quite match), but given how close that one Colombia friendly lineup was to the one you posted, it's very possible that the lineup in your magazine is from one of those other Marlboro Cup games from around the same time.
They played four Marlboro Cups in 1989, in the Orange Bowl, Giants Stadium, Soldier Field, and LA Coliseum. Is there any chance of getting a better scan of the photo? The background doesn't remind me of any of those stadiums, but it is very fuzzy.
That looks like a very 1989 lineup, but Hugo Perez had only two caps in 1989, though he could have appeared more in games against club opponents.
I did not think I'd be able to find a better resolution given how old the magazine is plus being a foreign publication but here it is: https://static.esam.ir/sell/itemImages/3814716/26942088_1731356475_157.jpg I'm still not convinced that is Perez but I'm not sure who else it could be.
Perhaps another clue: behind supposedly Perez is a sign that starts with "PR" and ends in "ET". Maybe someone recognizes what that might have said.
That does not look like a U.S. stadium. More like a stadium you'd find in Central America or the Caribbean.
I was trying to figure out if that could possibly be the National Stadium in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, where the 1989 away qualifier against El Salvador was played. That was the only qualifier that Hugo Perez played in that year, and he scored, but the overall lineup does not match. I'm pretty sure that is Hugo Perez. He had hair like that, and the "beard" could be shadows, and the photographic and printing effects can also distort skin tone.
Could it possibly a stadium in France? The US played 3 games on consecutive days there in 1988 against club teams. I have no info about the lineups but Vanole played in a bunch of games that year. Here is some info about those games.
I found a clearer picture on Spanish language World Cup cards. For starters that definitely is Perez based on this brighter picture. Secondly the fact that Spanish cards are using this picture as the US team picture for the World Cup kinda hints that the game was played against and possibly in a Central American country. The angle is slightly different so there are other things about the stadium visible although blurry.
I found a much clearer version of the second picture where it's possible to read some of the signs. The one behind Windischmann seemingly says "t. Vincent". Perhaps St. Vincent although I don't know of any game the US played there in the 80s.
If all of those images are from a single camp, Gansler became head coach in '89, Gyau made his debut in '89, and Gabarra's and Vanole's last cap each was in '89. So I'm going to say that was '89. But that's all I've got.
I think I may have cracked the code. In August of 1989 the US played 2 games in St. Vincent against Italian clubs. The one against As Roma was a 4-3 win. The other game with a different lineup was a 1-0 loss against Sampdoria and the lineup matches perfectly (other than Banks being spelled as Banils). https://www.almanaccogiallorosso.it/1989-1990/Amichevoli/4/Roma-USA.html http://www.asromaultras.org/8990RomaFiorentina_3-8-89_La_Stampa_af.jpg
This write-up of those games is amusing: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-08-10-sp-311-story.html When AS Roma suffered perhaps the ultimate embarrassment for a soccer team from the powerful Italian League, losing to the United States last Saturday at a tournament in Northern Italy, an Italian sports daily, Gazetta dello Sport, called it a “sad spectacle.” But the Romans can take comfort from the fact that they are not alone. Two other respected teams, America Cali of Colombia and Benefica of Portugal, were similarly treated in their local papers because they lost games this year to the United States. And after the recent U.S. victory at Chicago over a leading Polish team, Ruch Chorzow, president of the Polish soccer federation, called from Warsaw to tell the players that they had disgraced the country. Is it any wonder that Juventus of Turin, one of the world’s most successful and famous teams, would rather not have to play the United States? But that is the 22-time Italian League champion’s assignment tonight at 7 in the Marlboro Cup at the Coliseum. . . . Will Juventus’ players take the United States seriously? If they watched the Americans’ games from the Memorial Baretti tournament last weekend at St. Vincent, Italy, they will. Sampdoria did not. U.S. goalkeeper David Vanole of Manhattan Beach said the Sampdoria players were overheard before the game telling their fans that they would run up the score so that the reserves could play in the second half. It never happened. Sampdoria won, 1-0, with a goal in the 58th minute. In the consolation game, the United States scored three goals within eight minutes during the second half to win, 4-3, against AS Roma, which finished eighth last year in the Italian League. “Teams outside of our region don’t give us a lot of respect, but that serves us well,” U.S. Coach Bob Gansler said Wednesday. One of Gansler’s challenges has been to convince his own players that they belong on the same field with teams such as Juventus. It appears as if he has done a good job. As a young goalkeeper, Vanole’s idol was Dino Zoff. A legend in goal, Zoff was one of the stars for Italy when it won the 1982 World Cup. Since then, Vanole’s nickname has been Dino. On Wednesday at the Coliseum, he finally had a chance to meet Zoff, who is Juventus’ coach. “I got to shake hands with him,” Vanole said. He sounded impressed. But not too impressed. “Now that that’s out of the way,” he said, “I’m going to go out and beat him.”
That would make more sense than Italian clubs flying to the Caribbean. The multi tiered wall closest to the camera looks exactly like the one in the team picture background.