Patrick Agyemang has enjoyed a productive first EFL Championship season with Derby County and veteran centerback Tim Ream has taken notice of the league’s impact on the American forward.
Agyemang and Ream are both part of Mauricio Pochettino’s U.S. men’s national team roster for upcoming friendlies against Belgium and Portugal. The 25-year-old Agyemang has contributed 10 goals and three assists for John Eustace’s Rams this season, helping Derby fight for a spot in the promotion playoffs.
While some players might struggle with the EFL Championship’s physicality and grueling schedule, Agyemang has flourished, playing a large part in Derby County’s squad.
A former teammate of Agyemang at Charlotte FC, Ream praised his growth abroad, noticing the positive adjustments to his game.
“Everything has developed a little bit more, and he’s still not finished. And I think that’s the scary thing, and the really good thing,” Ream said in a conference call with media on Monday. “He’s playing confident, and he’s scoring goals.
“I’m seeing games that he’s playing, he’s playing full 90-minute matches,” Ream added. “For me that tells me he’s in a place mentally and physically that he feels good. And when you feel good, you just feel like you can do anything.”
Agyemang has already tied a career-high with 36 appearances this season and is on pace to play over 3,000 minutes for the Rams. Despite getting a late start with the club due to offseason surgery last summer, Agyemang has quickly become a fan favorite, doing whatever he can to help the Rams be part of a potential promotion push to the Premier League.
Agyemang hinted at the aggressiveness of the EFL Championship, admitting that its toughness has led to his positive development abroad.
“The biggest one that I always say, it was just the physicality part. It’s very, very intense as well. In England, it was just very demanding on that,” Agyemang said. “At times you think you get a foul or something, and it’s just not a call, and it’s play on and play on. So obviously it’s very aggressive in that nature.”
Ream, who played 12 years in England with Fulham and Bolton Wanderers, has featured in both the Premier League and Championship. The 38-year-old defender totaled 395 appearances between his two stops abroad, delivering one of the better careers of an American player to date.
Eight of Ream’s 13 seasons abroad were in England’s second-tier, with three of concluding with Fulham’s promotion back to the top flight. The veteran centerback knows how tough playing abroad can be, but also knows the key factor it can play on a player’s career long-term.
“Football is football,” Ream said. “There’s different ways of playing, [but] the Championship, for me, I think it makes you grow up. It makes you understand and appreciate what it takes day in and day out. “You’re playing Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, and it forces you to really look at all the small things in terms of recovery, in terms of what you’re doing when you’re not training.”
Both Agyemang and Ream will hope to be in Pochettino’s starting lineup on Saturday when the USMNT faces Belgium at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.