18 year old American midfielder Duane Holmes is close to getting minutes with Huddersfield Town of the English Championship. He's a dual citizen with England but he wants to play for the United States. I figure it's worth a thread since no one really knows about him. But making the bench in an FA Cup game at young age is decent and if he gets minutes this year I think he'll at least get on the radar for the U20 team if they qualify. Anyway, here is an interview. http://www.yanks-abroad.com/content.php?mode=show&id=9862
Seems a bit late in the game for the U-20 WC, but great to see how emphatic he was about representing America. Definitely one to watch, I love it when a player just pops up out of nowhere.
This week he scored 2 goals for Huddersfield in their 3-2 loss in the FA Youth Cup to Nottingham Forest. http://www.examiner.co.uk/huddersfi...youth-cup-run-says-tony-carss-86081-32761248/ A bunch of publications thought he was going to make the bench yesterday in the Championship game vs. Cardiff but it didn't happen
Sorry but it says in the article he is waiting to make his first team debut, but earlier you said he scored twice in the FA Cup. I assume you're talking about a league appearance correct?
Offered his first professional contract today. Congrats to him http://www.htafc.com/news/article/a...-pro-deals-749534.aspx?pageView=full#anchored
Duane Holmes @DuaneHolmes3h Couldn't think of anything I wanna do more than represent the US in the U20 world cup
Any chance? Yes. But it's a long shot he goes to Turkey. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if he is invited to the April U20 camp or even gets a look at Toulon. His chances would be a lot better if he were a defender!
So true...for whatever reason I always thought we would develop defenders first. It still strikes me a bit odd that our U-20's and U-17's have a strong front 6 but are vunerable in the back.
^Only cuz of injuries. Packwood and Pelosi get better and this team is alot different. Zimmerman's down too. And Sean Cunningham. And if Brooks joins up then thats hugely diff. Re: Duane Holmes I honestly doubt he gets a call to camp. Seems like he kinda just appeared recently. When you have guys with first team exp. like McBean not even making the first squad I just doubt he makes the squad even if he is called in. Would love to see him (or anyone else) prove me wrong though!
Do I think Holmes will be called in? No. I also don't think his lack of first-team experience should hurt him too much. Holmes is a midfielder. His competition is Trapp, Stanko, Lopez, Joya, and perhaps Torre. Aside from a few games from Joya, there's not much first team games The problem for Holmes is that it's very late in the cycle. If the World Cup were a year away, instead of two months away, then it would be completely different. If that were the case, I would say he would probably get called in.
A national youth team should be a revolving door. Nobody should be denied the chance to impress because lateness in a cycle. The U-20 results are meaningless. Evaluating new potential players is more important for the end game at this level.
I don't.............................but I don't think anybody would have a problem if he was. Few of us have seen enough of him to have any sort of opinion. As far as outside-the-WCQ midfielders go, I'd think guys such as Collin Martin, Dan Metzger, a healthy Victor Pineda, Alejandro Guido, etc. would be possiblities for the camp. Maybe even Acosta, but he's pretty young. We also have to consider that if Holmes has actually broken into the Huddersfield first team, getting his release for the April camp might be a problem. They're in a serious relegation battle at the moment, and might want "all hands on deck."
Both are likely on the outside looking in but if you're throwing Acosta's name in there you'd have to do the same with Zach Pfeffer given that he's actually played in MLS.