BRAD FRIEDEL GOES SCOUTING FOR TALENT

United States Under 19 team coach, Brad Friedel went scouting for new talents when he attended the playoffs for the Under 16s and Under18s at an event organized by the US soccer Development Academy at FC Dallas facility.

One hundred and ninety six teams participated in the event with more than 3,600 players in competition in the 17 fields available.

The Frisco facility event was held for seven days but there were no admission fees, concessions, rosters or even identifications for the players. Jeremy Gunn, the head coach of NCAA champion Stanford, was at the event. He said:
“This is where the best young players in the country are playing. There are an awful lot of great young soccer players playing for the different academy teams across the country.

“Academy soccer has been the highest level of youth soccer in this country in recent years. As a result, the talent pool is fantastic,” he added.

The event had 306 coaches, including 113 head coaches picked from 200 colleges. The seven-day event had as much as 16 games going on at a time, totalling 297 in all. Friedel played his own youth football at Newcastle before he joined up with Brondby IF in 1994. He played in Turkey, the US and the English Premier League where he featured for Liverpool, Blackburn, Villa and Spurs. He retired in 2015m, joined Punditry before his coaching appointment. Friedel used the event to watch a large number of young players participate in the event, especially at a point where the senior team needs competition. There were also Pro scouts from Mexico and other South American countries at the event.

Chris Hayden, the vice president of FC Dallas youth was quoted saying “you may not know who they are now, but in five years if you looked back, yeah, there are going to be some key players on the US national team.”