What a ridiculous notion. Freddy being captain and friends with the other players caused them to underachieve? More like people just can't evaluate players well and overhype them.
A family friend went from straight A's to D's as a high school junior because he became friends with some loser and started goofing off, the margins in professional soccer are much finer... just losing focus for a while can totally throw off some prospect's career trajectory. Kids and young adults can really influence each other negatively and Adu is clearly not a good influence based on the last decade plus. Also there can be multiple factors, overhype, bad evaluation, bad coaching... Maybe Adu's corrupting influence was only 2% of it. But I would still think twice before paying good money to have him around my kids. Yes plenty of bad-to-mediocre players end up being good-to-great coaches, but I'd wait and see on that. My educated guess / prediction is that Adu is just about as far from being the next Marsch / Berhalter as one can get.
It's really time to stop over-analyzing this. Pulisic nailed it when he commented on US player development: “Why is it that EU players are allowed to move country once they turn 16 … but non-Europeans can only do so at 18?” he writes on the Players’ Tribune. “Why aren’t we campaigning for a level playing field, where our best 16 year olds – who may not have an EU passport like I had – are free to move when they turn 16, like the best young players in Europe can? And in the meanwhile, as long as some of our best young players aren’t getting the opportunity like I had to go to Europe when they’re 16 … are we doing everything in our power to make sure the level of play in US soccer is high enough so that they can continue to develop up to their maximum potential? Christian Pulisic: 'It was scary – you’re not thinking about football that night or the next day' Read more In his article, Pulisic plays down comments from people who see him as the saviour of US soccer: “I’m not a prodigy – or a ‘wonderboy,’ as some have put it.” Instead, while conceding he was born with some natural talent, he says that his experience of going to Europe young helped him develop. “In the US system, too often the best player on an under-17 team will be treated like a ‘star’ – not having to work for the ball, being the focus of the offense at all times, etc – at a time when they should be having to fight tooth and nail for their spot,” writes Pulisic. “In Europe, on the other hand, the average level of ability around you is just so much higher. It’s a pool of players where everyone has been ‘the best player,’ and everyone is fighting for a spot – truly week in and week out. Which makes the intensity and humility that you need to bring to the field every day – both from a mental and physical perspective – just unlike anything that you can really experience in US developmental soccer. Without those experiences, there’s simply no way that I would be at anywhere close to the level that I am today.” Our boys in that class are exactly what Pulisic describes. I think we created the atmosphere that produced average pre-madonnas.
Not sure what any of this has to do with Freddy Adu. Does anyone really know how he is doing and most importantly , is he going to officially retire soon?
Pulisic went from a pay to pay academy, which prepares bright rich kids for college, to one of the top 5 professional academies in the world, in a top 5 league in the world. Of course there's a difference.
1131030415328927744 is not a valid tweet id 1131033048869416960 is not a valid tweet id One of Freddy’s best games.
That one, and the olympics against Holland. I've never seen any other American come close to dominating a game the way he did. Hell, even against Brazil in 2007 he looked amazing.
Holy ********. I've always been 2 years older than him but for some reason his 30th seems so old. He's had the ultimate "Peter Pan" career.
1131030415328927744 is not a valid tweet id Off topic, but wow, Michael Bradley with hair. I'd forgotten he wasn't just born bald.
Happy 30th birthday to local legend @FreddyAdu! pic.twitter.com/kN4HWGLCGa— DMV Soccer (@DMVSoccer96) June 3, 2019
On a day when our U-20s fall in their third consecutive quarterfinal, a decent run in most respects, I am reminded that I have never been as excited about any youth player as I purely and naively was on this day in 2003.
I'm actually in Ghana travelling through West Africa a bit... then this thread pops up. Will ask around to see if anyone here has any recollection of who Freddy Adu is...
The abyss between the Freddy Adu that we saw as possible in 2003 versus the Freddy Adu of today is about as profound as between the USMNT we saw as possible in 2003 versus the USMNT of today...........
I studied in Legon for six months in 2002. I made 10 friends a day talking about soccer. When a big club team would score a goal in a big game, Hearts of Oak and Asante Kotoko were the biggest, the entire campus would be an instantaneous goal celebration. I loved it, it was an awesome time.
Jeez... I had forgotton that. It looks like a Pele highlight. Sure, it's against young South Koreans, not top Internationals, but he looked really talented.