Fredy Adu - Biography

Last Editor: steenjespersen				Fredy Adu Biography -   Name : Fredy Adu Date of birth : June 2, 1989 Place of birth : Tema, Ghana

Fredy Adu Trivia -

Youngest player ever to participate in the All-Star game of any professional sport. An admirer of Argentina's Diego Maradona.

Fredy Adu Detailed Biography -

Adu learned to kick a ball at the age of two; soon after, he was hitting rocks and refreshment bottles barefooted like many African soccer stars before him. Adu left Ghana with his family in 1997 after his mother won a lottery for a United States visa. Adu and his younger brother attended elementary school at Sequoyah Elementry School in Derwood, Maryland. At age 13, Adu joined the Bradenton Academy, U.S. Soccer's premier youth residency program. At the age of 14, he signed a professional contract with Major League Soccer. He is now a resident of Potomac, Maryland in the United States and a U.S. citizen. Some major European teams looked into the possiblity of signing Adu but did not due to employment legislation in Britain that states players cannot join FA Premier League teams professionally until they turn 17; before this they are limited to very low paying apprenticeship contracts. Adu's agent opted for a contract in the United States, partially because of the financial situation, but also because joining MLS gave the young player the opportunity to play professional soccer very near to his home in Potomac, Maryland. Adu played for the United States in two tournaments in 2003, the FIFA U-17 World Championship in Finland and the World Youth Championship in the United Arab Emirates. In order to allow Adu to play close to home, MLS assigned him to D.C. United, on November 18, 2003, working a deal with the Dallas Burn, who owned the top pick in the 2004 MLS SuperDraft. Dallas was compensated with a player allocation. Having already signed with D.C. United, Adu effectively became the first player selected in that draft, two months before it officially took place. On April 3, 2004 Adu came on in United's first game of the 2004 season against the San Jose Earthquakes as a second-half substitute, making him the youngest professional sportsman in United States professional sports history since fourteen-year-old Fred Chapman played Major League Baseball in Philadelphia in 1887. On April 17, he scored his first professional goal in the 75th minute of a 3-2 away loss against the MetroStars. In his first season as a professional, Adu showed a great deal of potential, pouted about playing time, and finished the year with five goals and three assists, while playing in all 30 regular season games. Although briefly a starter, Adu was relegated to a substitute when D.C. United acquired central midfielder Christian Gómez midseason, and it was in this role that he appeared in United's MLS Cup victory. He played in three of D.C.'s four playoff games, coming off the bench each time; he tallied one assist in the postseason. Adu got his first cap for the senior national team on January 22, 2006, against Canada, making him the youngest player ever for the men's senior side (at 16 years, 234 days).