That's another thing with Adu. So far in his career, he has shown us that he's a player that showed up for the big games (Brazil U20, Spain, Argentina, Holland U23). However, he just looked average in other games (Korea, Japan, Barbados, T&T, etc.) For now, it's great to see him play exceptional well against huge competitions, but at some point he needs to bring the consistency, which I believe will come naturally as he grows and start playing regularly for both club and Nat.
I'm sure he's improved, and equally sure it will never be a strength of his. Better to capitalize on the strengths he does have, namely sublime touch and agility. Play fast, play smart, move the ball, pick the spots to attack off the dribble, and Freddy can do very well indeed.
Bold very bold I feel freddy plays off his teammates and opponents if you surround him with world class players or even quality freddy will shine. You put him in a big game freddy will shine. If you put him with average players and average team he will look average. He seems to feed off the game he does not just take it over he needs to get in the flow.
He came in as a late sub aganst a tired team or, at least, Masch was prety tired after playing and traveling). That is irrelevant, however, in any case. He either looks fast enough for Monaco or he doesn't. The French league, Monaco's performance notwithstanding, is a tough, low-scoring, athletic group. On the above criteria, it's far ahead of Portugal, which has a couple of solid teams but a lot of riffraff otherwise. (Ligue 1 is ranked 4th currently by UEFA, Portugal is 8th and living off the Mourinho era Porto glory) I am not sure if it was a smart move for a part-time player to go from the 8th ranked league to the 4th ranked. It would seem to make more sense if Freddy stayed in Portugal on loan to another squad or was loaned to somewhere like Holland (9th place) with a similar level of overall play. But then again, Freddy's handlers never gave him the best of advices in the past either.
The number one team in the world was so tired by the time Adu came in that he just breezed by them. No, he moved fast, with skill. Why?
Hmmm... a bold prediction indeed. Which scenario seems most likely? * Top three vote getter for World Player of Year two times in career * Gets 30 minutes playing time in WC 2010, 180 minutes in WC 2014 and scores 2 goals in WC 2018. * Retires from professional football at age 23 to become marketing rep for Nike freestyle/street soccer campaign and the "Adu Shoe". * Takes year off to dedicate himself to strength and fitness and re-emerges in 2012 playing in Serie B with the nickname "mini-Essien" * Is bought by Man City and becomes personal trainer for sheik's kids. Hard to say with a 19 year old. It could go in any direction.
Isn't there a Freddy Adu Career Prediction thread? EDIT: here ya go https://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showthread.php?t=577048&highlight=freddy+adu+career
Basile pulled half of his team off because they were tired. Masch, when he was red carded, was dead tired. Of course, you'll be probably claiming now that Adu is better than Masch. Because he looks small and slow now and the international friendlies aren't "money" games and the players aren't scouted and so on. You take it into a league like the French and you'll always find a tough tackling midfielder who's stronger, faster and bigger than Freddy and has studied all of Freddy's moves from the previous videos. That doesn't mean that Freddy will never beat his marker but that, by giving away a lot of speed and strength, he'll not have a success percentage that is required for a player in his (CAM) spot. And I'll add two more obvious points - regular season games are given a lot more lenient treatment than the Youth World Cups, where a slight foul results in a yellow, and there no limited roster problems in regular league play, which often causes very careful, "non-Mastroeni" like, tackling in the major events. Plus, France seem to be on the more lenient-to-tight-marking end of all major Euro leagues. In that regard, it's quite similar to MLS where Freddy didn't exactly shine in his last few outings.
I am struggling with the notion that Freddy is slow and small. Certainly, he's not big, like Shalrie Joseph, for example, but certainly the big European leagues are full of players of about Freddy's size. Since I watched Freddy play outside mid for DCU in a 3-5-2 with some real success, I don't see him as slow. Not as fast as Marvell Wynne, perhaps, but not slow; maybe faster and quicker than average. If you are saying that the French league features goonish midfielders, then yes technically adept players will have to adapt. They are not going to juke their way past the opposition. Frankly, I don't see much fancy footwork and ball skills in the English leagues either, certainly not in the middle of the field. The defenders are too good and too strong to make such tactics feasible. The key is to move the ball quickly and, when it's necessary to hold the ball, use quickness and skill to evade a tackle. I don't see why this should mean that Freddy can't be a success. He's smart. He adjusts his game. And he's not prone to holding the ball. In fact, in the latest national team game, I would have faulted him for passing too soon. On several occasions, when Freddy played for DCU against the Revolution, NE assigned Joseph to mark Freddy all over the field, certainly a physical mismatch. Freddy coped nonetheless. Right now Freddy seems slotted for the middle of the field; certainly he has said that he prefers playing there. But he has shown that he can play elsewhere. Given Freddy's obvious abilities (and his clearly evident willingness to be a team player) I wouldn't be at all surprised if some crafty coach played him in another position in order to get him on the field.
Hmmm.... Based on this thread, I think if we actually do get a world class player - and we haven't anyone that's even close - then we will destroy him. What if he fails us in our moment of greatest need? ...the poor fool.
What's worse is that practically no matter when he fails we will retroactively label it our moment of greatest need.
I think of 'speed' and 'quickness,' like an NFL announcer does, as two different things. Freddy has an excellent first step and amazingly quick feet. As far as speed goes, he's always getting himself run down from behind. It tends to mean that Freddy can beat guys, but once he does he only has 10 yards or so to get rid of the ball. He can't go on that 40 yard run that Landon Donovan sometimes can. Which doesn't mean he can never be effective, it just means you have to control a lot on the field to allow him to be effective. You have to keep him nearer to the goal than your normal #10, and you have to have guys who can get open for him to pass to fairly quickly.
I think as much as anything, it's that he doesn't (or didn't, because he's gotten better) do a good job of rating his speed against the competition. He's not slow, but he's not as fast as he thinks he is (I'm thinking of an MLS game a few years ago when he consistently beat Marvell Wynne with the dribble and then acted like all he had to do was run, in which case Wynne caught him up in a few strides). I see him doing better at making space and using it quickly these days (when I have a chance to see him).
OK, I suppose he can now and again, but in general he is not that type of player. The other team nearly always has guys who can close him down. Yeah, I've noticed that he often doesn't "hear the footsteps" well. He seems not to understand someone will be coming until they're there, and then all he can do is look for contact and a foul call, which he often doesn't get in those situations.
And is that something that is coachable? My first instinct is think players like Freddy have vision, and a sense of surroundings, yet Freddy has show he doesnt (yet) in this aspect... It just confuses me, b/c its almost like he does alot of the "difficult things well" yet messes up on the easy/obvious stuff.... ("easy" sitting from chair in front of the TV of course. )
Ah, the slow retreat from the really dumb comment. We are now crawling back from "Freddy is slow" (obviously not true) to "well, there is always someone faster on the other team" (perhaps true, but also true of nearly every player) and changing the subject to "he doesn't have eyes in the back of his head" (true, but also true of just about everyone else (I'm allowing for the existence of some alien life forms)). I have always thought it was your teammates' responsibility to warn you of potential tacklers that you couldn't see, but maybe no one yells "man on" or its equivalent in Europe.
I ain't crawling back. By the standards of top wings/forwards, Freddy is not a particularly good athlete. The guys who run like him are much bigger. The guys who are his size, are much faster. If all this stuff about Freddy being able to blow by guys were true, he wouldn't be mouldering on a Monaco bench. I'm quite willing to accept the proposition that coaches are stupid, too conservative about playing young flair kids, etc., but they're not so stupid as to fail to notice great athletes with skill who can blast by defenders off the dribble. Those players, they don't miss.
I would be curious how he would measure up in his current form in the MLS? He clearly did not stick out when he was in the States. You see young players like Holden, Rogers and Sacha all playing well and making names for themselves, yet Freddy is not going places fast (compare to Altidore). The description above on the current Freddy is accurate though -however you need to add though he strikes the ball well with both feet.
Now we're erecting a straw man and battering him to death. Maybe I missed something, but I don't recall anyone claiming that Freddy was a great athlete with skill who could blast by defenders on the dribble. A better than average athlete with excellent skills? I think so. Able to dribble past defenders? Depends on the defender. I don't see very many players dribbling past defenders in the better European leagues. To the extent that anyone can dribble past defenders at a high level, Freddy has the quickness and skill required, but his size works against him. Like many (most?) players, he has to choose his moment carefully.