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Akinola completes brace in big win for U.S. U-17s at IMG Cup

Photo via U.S. Soccer.
Photo via U.S. Soccer.

Ayo Akinola cannot stop scoring these days for the U.S. Under-17 Men’s National Team.

The Toronto FC youngster completed a brace as the U-17s pummeled Rio Grand Valley’s U-19 squad 5-0 on Thursday afternoon. Akinola has now scored 21 goals in 2016.

Andrew Carleton also got on the scoresheet after bagging a wonderful solo goal as he dribbled through several defenders en route to the U-17s’ fourth goal of the day.

The U.S. will play Tottenham’s Under-18 squad in its next game on Saturday.

Comments

    • Because his parents have American (and Nigerian) citizenship. So he actually eligible for Nigeria, USA, and Canada. From what I understand, he never actually lived in the US, though. He was born and raised in Canada if I am correct. I would be pissed if I was Canada who is lean on talent. Nigeria has a few players as good is not better than him, so no huge loss to them.

      Reply
      • It’s never fun losing out on a talent to another nation especially if the kid spent his entire life in the country, but such is the nature of the dual national.

        We have lost and will continue to lose players, but we have also gained and will continue to gain them as well.

      • From what I understand about the situation, TFC actually encouraged him to play for the US instead of Canada as they thought it was better for his development. That makes sense since the club team doesn’t really care where the player plays internationally as long as he becomes a good asset for the club and one they could sell or trade later on at a higher value. There was a similar situation with the Whitecaps, I believe, a couple of years ago where the Whitecaps encouraged one of their Canadian academy players to play for Chile instead, since he was eligible for them as well.

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