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January 9, 2010 8:44 AM Bookmark and Share

What can Adu do about the World Cup?

Four years ago he was too young to be considered. Four years on he's just the right age to make an impression. Yet at 20, Freddy Adu appears farther away from his World Cup dream than he was at 16.
 
As U.S. national team coach Bob Bradley overseas a training camp in California, Adu is settling into new surroundings in Greece - the latest, and possibly last, stop on a European tour which has yet to pay dividends.
 
Signed with MLS when he was only 14
 
Adu, the former American wunderkind, so good he was signed up by Major League Soccer at the tender age of 14, is searching for a way back. A way back to the days when he was a goal scoring prodigy with DC United and a way back into Bradley's plans to play on the continent of his birth in six months time.
 
It's a big, if not impossible, ask for a player who has spent much of the last two and a half years in a soccer wilderness. With only a handful of appearances in Portugal and France to his name in the last couple of seasons, Adu has slowly but surely disappeared off the US international radar.
 
He featured in only three games for the U.S. national team during 2009 - the most recent a Gold Cup group match against Honduras last July. Not only did he fail to finish the tournament due to European commitments, Adu wasn't considered for the final four World Cup qualifiers which followed in the fall.
 
Charlie Davies, Jozy Altidore, Conor Casey, Brian Ching and Kenny Cooper all led the line at differing times. There was even an international recall for Jeff Cunningham towards the end of the year but Adu's name has become conspicuous by its absence in recent months.
 
Surplus to requirements at Benfica, Monaco and Belenenses, Adu has used the European transfer window to sign an 18-month loan deal with Aris FC of the Greek Super League. There he'll link up with compatriot Eddie Johnson -another American for whom the European dream has turned somewhat sour.
 
Perhaps they can spark each other into life. The fact is they have to if either is to force their way onto Bradley's World Cup roster. Adu and Johnson have both fallen from grace and both need to start playing and scoring in abundance in the second half of the Greek season.
 
Time not on Adu's side
 
Unfortunately for both, time which was already short just got shorter. Aris, currently occupying a top four spot under the leadership of Argentine manager Hector Cuper, has only 14 League matches remaining before the campaign concludes in mid-April. 
 
It stands to reason, therefore, that Adu would have to make an immediate impact at his new home to get back into Bradley's reckoning. His first task is to earn some playing time and then make the sort of impression he left at the FIFA U-20 World Cup in Canada which pre-empted his original move to Portugal.
 
There is no doubt Adu has talent but that is not enough to re-ignite his international career. Just how much his confidence has been dented after being peddled around Europe only he will know, but Bradley cannot take a chance on a player whose mental focus is surely vulnerable.
 
His latest move is being seen as a last chance to 'make it' in Europe and whatever he may say publicly, Adu is aware there is pressure to re-produce the goods which made him the youngest player in MLS history. Maybe he was too young. Maybe it was too soon.
 
Maybe he should cut his losses and come home. Adu still has time on his side - lots of time. Not for this World Cup but for the next one and the one after that. For all the hype and the endorsements, Freddy Adu is effectively still a soccer apprentice. And all apprentices need to learn their trade.
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