Gio Reyna’s impressive first six months at Borussia Dortmund has earned him a spot with the first team going forward.
After Ruhr Nachrichten reported the news on Monday, the club promoted Reyna to the senior squad as they return to Bundesliga play this weekend. The 17-year-old joined the club from NYCFC in the summer and since has scored eight goals and added eight assists for Dortmund’s Under-19 team in 16 appearances across all competitions.
Reyna has appeared in the Bundesliga U-19 West, the UEFA Youth League, and DFB Youth Cup. He spent part of the summer in the United States with Dortmund’s first team while also recently scoring in a friendly loss to Feyenoord.
Reyna was also included in Dortmund’s 31-player UEFA Champions League roster and was named to the bench in a 5-0 league win over Fortuna Dusseldorf earlier this season.
“He presented himself well in Marbella, that’s why we want to put him on a much higher level at training,” Dortmund sporting director Michael Zorc said. “We want to develop him to a full-fledged player of Borussia Dortmund.”
Internationally, Reyna has moved through the ranks of U.S. Soccer, appearing in the FIFA U-17 World Cup in 2019 and also appearing in a USMNT U-23 training camp under head coach Jason Kreis.
Reyna will look to make his league debut on Saturday as fourth-place Borussia Dortmund takes on Augsburg away from home.
If Reyna even gets a few minutes with Dortmund he’ll be called in March. The camp is in Europe, several other wingers are likely to be in Olympic qualifying, and MLS will be just a couple weeks in.
And take him away from his chance of earning a spot in the first team? That’s stupid.
First he needs to prove he belongs in the top flight of football.
Almost all of BvBs first teamers will be away with their national teams, who would he be training with. Indications are he’s earned his way onto the first team not that there are injuries and it’s just spot duty like Hyndman with Fulham, Wright with Schalke, Gooch when he started for Sunderland vs Man City, Perez at Fiorentina.