When Jesse Marsch helped Leeds United avoid relegation from the English Premier League it was clear he would have a major say in the molding of the squad going forward, so it should come as no surprise that one of his major moves involved reuniting with a top American player he knows all too well.
Leeds United has completed the transfer for U.S. men’s national team midfielder Tyler Adams, announcing the finalized move on Wednesday for a reported fee of $24 million.
Adams arrives in the wake of Leeds United selling standout English midfielder Kalvin Phillips to Manchester City, and comes a month after Leeds completed the $30 million acquisition of fellow USMNT midfielder Brenden Aaronson.
Adams reunites with Marsch, who was his coach with the New York Red Bulls when he broke through with the first-team after making the move up from the Red Bulls academy to Red Bulls II on his way to being an MLS standout. Adams and Marsch reunited again at RB Leipzig, when Adams completed his transfer to the German Bundesliga side while Marsch was an assistant coach there before leaving to take over as manager of Red Bull Salzburg. Marsch eventually returned to RB Leipzig as head coach for the 2021-2022 season, but was fired during the season after the team endured a difficult start to the season.
Adams played 37 matches in all competitions for RB Leipzig in last season, including 20 starts, but it became clear later in the season that he was expendable, with manager Domenico Tedesco having Konrad Laimer and Kevin Kampl as preferred central midfield options.
USMNT have plenty of reason to be excited, especially with the possibility of Adams and Aaronson being partnered together in central midfield.
Leeds United begins its English Premier League season on August 6 at home against Wolves.
What do you think of Adams move to Leeds? See him thriving in the Premier League?
Share your thoughts below.
JRazor,
Pulisic’s relationship with Tuchel is fine.
The only problem is that Tuchel sees Pulisic as more valuable coming off the bench.
Other than that everything is great. Many of us have a person in our lives that we have to prove wrong. Pulisic is just going to have to be on fire every single second he gets on the field/pitch. Nothing wrong with that.
I don’t know why people are so against Pulisic having to earn every single cent of his paycheck.
cause i don’t buy the political argument that players get better by osmosis sitting elite club benches. i think they show up better and fitter when they get plenty of minutes. as such i see it as suboptimal for us to have whole chunks of the NT riding pine to prove your political point that isn’t true. i think there should be more focus on objective form and performance and less abstract family values theories of how they should just stay put and work harder. that is only true if one assumes pulisic was already phoning it in. most elite club players are not phoning it in and the nature of the setups is to attract piles of similar players and someone has to lose. the losers don’t generally suck and they aren’t totally lazy. unless one is just obsessed with “chelsea” and nothing else the smart money is go play for one of the many other teams in the world — probably as good or better — who would be happy to have him. in short, it’s tuchel specific.
“cause i don’t buy the political argument that players get better by osmosis sitting elite club benches. i think they show up better and fitter when they get plenty of minutes.”
No one said they get better by omosis. As for showing up better and fitter when they get plenty of minutes, again who is arguing against that?
I say you’re better if you show up getting minutes that you’ve earned . Pulisic has gotten as many minutes as he has earned.
He knows Tuchel, knows what he wants and he has the talent to give him what he wants.
If he doesn’t give him what he wants then that’s Pulsic’s problem not Tuchel’s. And it’s not Tuchel’s or Chelsea’s job to prep players for the USMNT.
“the smart money is go play for one of the many other teams in the world — probably as good or better —”
Smart ? I notice lots of smart teams lining up for Pulisic And I notice he’s still there. Need more time? Earn it or leave.
Not Leeds related but did anyone see the new “Know your teammate” video with Turner and Acosta put out by USSoccer. In it Turner is asked “Who has the best vibes?” Matt’s response “Christian Roldan”
Interesting there are rumors that Leeds is interested in acquiring Chris Richards. If it happens (big if given the reliability of rumors) that would be 3 US players on the Leeds squad.
Marsch appears to be looking to increase the number of US players in the Premier league singlehandedly. The players will be playing week in and week out against the overall strongest league. No other has the depth of the EPL. That should help prepare them for the WC.
It is unclear how quickly or even if the US players will be loved by the fans. So there may be some mental toughness required of the players if things get off to a bad start.
“Marsch appears to be looking to increase the number of US players in the Premier league singlehandedly.”
He’s not that stupid. He could probably get good deals on Long, Ariolla and Roldan if he just wants to bulk up on passport players.
Lletget and Yueill , what are they doing? You need that USMNT connection for the permit process.
Richards is probably be out of his price range if Bayern thinks they want to hang on to him and it looks like they do. He’s doing what every manager does, bring in as many of “his guys” as possible, guys who know his “system”.
He got Kristensen, non American but ex Salzburg, tried for Minamino and I bet he’d even go for Haaland if he could. Would anyone criticize him if he did that?
Not likely.
“It is unclear how quickly or even if the US players will be loved by the fans.”
Gimme a break. It’s crystal clear that if they play well they’ll “love” them. But the second they go back to sucking, they’ll hate them.
so bitter 😉
and break given…US players have been universally disrespected as soccer players and as a soccer nation until very very recently, and plenty still can’t find their way to do it, which I understand and enjoy. but agree 100% that if they jam they’ll be loved and if not, they won’t, just like anyone.
does the Adams signing preclude Camara signing?
Beachbum, I’d say yes Camara is probably off unless he’s planning on converting Roca to an AM. Doubtful Ty would play RB since Kristensen was just signed. That being said Transfermkt still only list them with two DMs and if Marsch wants to continue with his 4-2-3-1 he’ll need more depth there. Klich played there some under Marsch at the end of the season so he’s likely the depth. Sinisterra a LW from
Feyenoord seems the next target but probably waiting for Raphina to get sorted out. I’m not sure how much I buy the Richards rumor at this point any agent of an American can float Leeds interest to strengthen their bargaining power. We’ll see if the rumor sticks. I’m becoming far to familiar with Leeds YouTube Grassroots “Media” for my own health. They haven’t picked up on Richards interest as of yet.
Roldan nor Arriola is good enough for EPL.
Think Sinisterra is close to done and not contingent on Raph. Word is he had his physical today.
Rico Po: Sinesterra was announced today. Also Leeds won first friendly 4-0. None of the Americans played as players on International duty this summer did not report until this week.
Mr. bum,
“does the Adams signing preclude Camara signing?”
Apparently:
_According to a report in the Austrian newspaper Salzburger Nachrichten, as relayed by Sport Witness, Leeds United have reportedly pulled the plug on the €30 million deal to sign 22-year-old Malian enforcer Mohamed Camara from Red Bull Salzburg, with the Whites opting for a cheaper alternative in Tyler Adams instead.-
“US players have been universally disrespected as soccer players and as a soccer nation until very very recently, and plenty still can’t find their way to do it, which I understand and enjoy.”
Poor babies. Do you think Tyler and Jesse are where they are because RB wanted to sell shirts? I’d say it’s a little of both.
The important point is RB gave them a real chance, maybe because they had some familiarity with Adams and Marsch.
And both did enough with it to be where they are today. Not great but not terrible either.
“US players have been universally disrespected as soccer players and as a soccer nation until very very recently,”
With good reason. But BFD. like everyone doesn’t have to really prove themselves. That disrespect didn’t stop Brian McBride or Jay DeMerit or any other number of players.
But I have to admit that why Leeds persists with the Welsh Ariolla, Daniel James, is beyond me.
thanks for proving my point Vacqui. for a guy who posts so much, never an insight but instead just repeat the drivel you read.
the disrespected Americans had nothing to do with their play brainiac…remember when Bradley’s men beat Spain, broke their winning streak, and the world cried like babies (kind of like you :))
then Ancelotti’s Real Madrid beat Liverpool with a carbon copy strategy…and pundits call it brilliant! But not Bradley when he did it to Spain…because he was American. That team was panned in Europe, like they had ruined the game. Poor Spain…what a bunch of crybabies. That is but ONE example.
And I’m not crying about it, I’m stating it as fact. Because it is whether you think so or not.
I’m still waiting for you to drop one piece of insight here dude…I’m daring you
Mr. bum,
“the disrespected Americans had nothing to do with their play brainiac…remember when Bradley’s men beat Spain, broke their winning streak, and the world cried like babies (kind of like you :))”
Spain did not cry about it. Fernando Torres was very complementary afterwards. As I recall they were mostly stunned.
And their “disrespect” for the USMNT had everything to do with their losing that game.
Immediately after that loss I remember thinking Spain had the same problem with the USMNT that Portugal did in the 2002 World Cup.
Both Portugal and Spain were so overconfident and arrogant that they did not take the game seriously and forgot to play until it was way too late.
Of course, Bob and his guys were awesome , went 2-0 up on Brazil and almost pulled the same deal off in the final.
But then Brazil scored in the 46th minute and remembered who they were.
The magic wore off and that was it.
“then Ancelotti’s Real Madrid beat Liverpool with a carbon copy strategy…and pundits call it brilliant! But not Bradley when he did it to Spain…because he was American. That team was panned in Europe, like they had ruined the game. Poor Spain…what a bunch of crybabies. That is but ONE example.””
Bob beat Spain 13 years ago. What Bob did was great but not original and there have been any number of similar examples of the strategy used since 2009. Did you expect today’s pundits to talk about a 13 year old game?
Actually the Euros copied Bob’s strategy the very next year in the 2010 WC. And credited him for it.
“ Ottmar Hitzfeld praised the U.S. team and their manager’s strategy against La Roja Furia, credited it with helping Hitzfeld’s Swiss side defeat Spain in their match during the World Cup.
“We saw how the Americans played against Spain with a lot of interest,” the two-time World Coach of the Year said. “You know that if you are going to have a chance against [the Spanish] you need to do certain things very well. The USA did not try to do everything. They accepted the fact that Spain has pace and width and simply made sure they kept the center of defense as tight as they could. It is not a perfect system, but it was a very interesting tactic and it worked.”
I don’t know what the pundits said back in 2009- 2010 but Hitzfeld was a great manager and it was a big deal then and still is a big deal now to have been praised by him.
Soccer is a very unoriginal sport.
If you come to SBI looking for original insights in the comments section I would suggest you are overly optimistic.
The 49ers are a significant minority owner in Leeds. That helps. (We have seen similar signings happening in places like Venezia and Arsenal.). The coach is also American. That helps. I agree based on Swansea — where the bigoted fans went after the owners and Bradley — that the crowd is the x factor and they may or may not be happy with all the Americanness about. If they go from cellar-edge to significantly better that may help.
Re attracting players, people often ignore the role of the coach wanting you there at all, continuing to like you, or you falling out of favor or the coach gets fired and you’re orphaned. It is not always about your performance in and of itself. Sometimes you have a buddy in the coach. Sometimes you get crossways with a coach, who maybe even shortly later gets fired. Sometimes the coach who brought you in, leaves. This is one reason I pimp fit. I am sure the players looking there know that with the World Cup coming up, they will get a fair shake and maybe some playing time, probably one of the best places in Europe for that, at that level, that they could choose. So why go sign “Juve” or “Spurs” for the brand name but who knows how many minutes when Leeds will play you in the EPL (and 20 years ago was a brand name itself). Leeds’ spending suggests you are in on the ground floor of something ambitious, and the next 6 months are the really important ones for playing time for your NT chances this cycle. Once that’s passed you can risk take for a while.
Find the video of Pulisic at the new Chelsea jersey reveal. His smiling and laughing for the photo shoot and then Tuchel walks in and Christian goes stone faced. 100% edited to make it look bad but goes to your “relationship to your manager” point.
JRazor,
Pulisic’s relationship with Tuchel is fine.
The only problem is that Tuchel sees Pulisic as more valuable coming off the bench.
Other than that everything is great. Many of us have a person in our lives that we have to prove wrong. Pulisic is just going to have to be on fire every single second he gets on the field/pitch. Nothing wrong with that.
I don’t know why people are so against Pulisic having to earn every single cent of his paycheck.
Adam’s’ career trajectory has taken a real hit over the last 15 months or so. It wasn’t long ago he was playing in the champions league semi- final and very strongly linked to Arsenal. He had a sub-par season at RB and is now moving to one of the top relegation contenders in the premier league.
The next 9 are very important for his career
Nagelsman loved his versatility, Jesse obviously loves his tenacity, Todesco couldn’t figure out a way to use him. Maybe not the best suited for a possession style where he has to do the line breaking passing but should be suited to Marsch’s pressing system.
I think you’re right Johnny and we’ll see. seems like a good fit to me, hope he can stay healthy
It’s crazy how quickly the narrative re a player can go sour- including w/ our national team. He’s had some bumps for certain but we’ve all seen downturns or things not work with very good players with manager/system changes. Adams is still quality, young, high energy, intelligent and sure to keep improving. And the narrative will turn again I suppose.
I didn’t think he looked at his best for NT this spring and this will hopefully stop the bleeding. He then has to stay healthy which is always the x factor.
I love it……I LOVE IT!!!!!!
Tyler Adams – Leeds United
Brenden Aaronson – Leeds united
Jesse Marsch – Leeds United
……. Even as a Manchester United fan I think just found my solid second team to fully support on EPL Saturday and Sunday mornings!!!!!! I LOVE IT!!!!!!
–
GOOD LUCK AND ALL THE BEST!!!!
LoL. uhhhhut oh- you even mention MUFC or the color red in any Leeds circle and you’ll be thrown out.
a transfer is even better
Let’s go! I am happy he got transfered.