Former phenom back after two-year absence
Despite being absent from the national team picture for two years and playing for an obscure second-division club in Turkey, Freddy Adu was named to the U.S. roster for next month’s CONCACAF Gold Cup.
U.S. coach Bob Bradley made Adu one of his 23 selections announced Monday without seeing the former D.C. United phenom in person at Caykur Rizespor, where Adu has registered four goals since joining the promotion-seeking club on loan during the winter.
“We’ve watched him a number of different times on the computer,” Bradley said on a conference call with reporters. “Freddy is a player who in the past has shown us soccer qualities that we think will help our team. It hasn’t always added up enough yet with the full national team, but this seems like it’s a good opportunity to get him back in with us.”
| U.S. Gold Cup roster |
| Goalkeepers » Marcus Hahnemann, Tim Howard, Nick Rimando |
| Defenders » Carlos Bocanegra, Jonathan Bornstein, Steve Cherundolo, Clarence Goodson, Eric Lichaj, Oguchi Onyewu, Tim Ream, Jonathan Spector |
| Midfielders » Freddy Adu, Michael Bradley, Clint Dempsey, Landon Donovan, Maurice Edu, Benny Feilhaber, Jermaine Jones, Sacha Kljestan, Robbie Rogers |
| Forwards » Juan Agudelo, Jozy Altidore, Chris Wondolowski |
Adu, who will turn 22 next week, has gone from teen idol to journeyman since moving from Real Salt Lake to Benfica in 2007. He started brightly with the Portuguese club, but it has since loaned him to four different clubs — trial stints in Germany and Switzerland last winter also failed — and still owns his rights until the summer of 2012.
“Freddy had fallen out of the scene a little bit, and typically playing in the second division in Turkey doesn’t bring you back into the scene,” Bradley said. “We never thought the story was over, but again, now we will find out where it will fit for right now. The fact that we think this is a good chance to size it all it up again doesn’t mean that it’s automatically all there either.”
Trevor Moawad, the director of performance at IMG Academies in Bradenton, Fla., talked to Adu in Turkey moments after the roster was unveiled.
Adu was on the bus with Rizespor after it lost the first leg of a promotion playoff series 4-0. He and Moawad talked about the last time Adu was with the U.S. team, watching from the bench when the United States pulled off a stunning 3-0 win over Egypt to reach the 2009 Confederations Cup semifinals in South Africa.
Despite his excitement over the U.S. call, Adu’s mind was on figuring out how Rizespor could achieve its own comeback.
“It was exactly the way you’d want it to be: ‘Hey, I’m glad I’m on the roster, but I’ve got a ton to do,’?” Moawad said. “It was really more like ‘I’m walking into the door,’ not like ‘I’ve arrived.’ I think that his mindset is where it needs to be.”
