Sebastian Soto is hanging up his playing cleats at the age of 25.
Soto revealed the news on his Instagram account Monday, ending his six-year pro career. The former U.S. youth national team talent had been without a club since his contract with Austrian club Austria Klagenfurt was terminated by mutual consent in October 2024.
Born in California, Soto spent time in the youth systems of both the San Diego Surf and Real Salt Lake before moving to German side Hannover. Soto was committed to play collegiately at the University of California-Berkeley, but decided to go pro instead. He made his senior debut for Hannover in 2019 and proceeded to make five appearances for the club.
Soto later made the move to English side Norwich City but never made his senior debut there during his two years under contract. He impressed for Dutch side Telstar while on loan, scoring seven goals in 12 appearances.
Soto was also loaned to Porto’s B team as well as Scottish side Livingston, but he only scored one goal in 20 combined appearances between the two clubs.
After joining Austria Klagenfurt in 2022, Soto found playing time hard to come by while also fighting several injuries along the way. He scored once in 18 appearances for the first team while also making four appearances for the second team.
Soto featured for several U.S. youth national teams, playing a major role with the USMNT U-20’s at the 2019 FIFA U-20 World Cup. He scored six goals in 11 appearances for the U-20’s before later earning his senior debut under Gregg Berhalter in November 2020.
Soto scored twice on his debut in a 6-2 friendly win over Panama. He also featured in a friendly against Wales, but that would prove to be his first international appearance.
Damn, at only 25!!! Things must have been going downhill fast in his career to make him give up like this. He didn’t even consider coming home to MLS? Wish him all the best in his next endeavor…
He had back problems while in Austria, sometimes those are hard to overcome or play thru. Based on his production the last few years MLS probably wasn’t interested either. At that point do you want to slog thru USL on college football fields and minor league baseball diamonds?
Seems oddly ironic that this comes on the same day as the Campbell loan news. Soto never made it, some due to attitude some due to injury. Will Cole ever figure it out and make good on his Junior Bundesliga success? Sebastian and Richie Ledezma will always have that November night in an empty stadium in Austria during Covid.