With the No. 9 role for the U.S. men’s national team up for grabs, Ricardo Pepi is on the move.
The USMNT striker is leaving Augsburg for a season-long loan with FC Groningen in the Eredivisie. Groningen did not announce further details, but Fabrizio Romano has reported there is no purchase clause involved in the deal.
“(Groningen) is a big club here in the Netherlands,” Pepi told the club’s site. “They’ve developed some great players: Luis Suarez, Virgil van Dijk, Arjen Robben. These are world-class players. I know this is a great club for me, and it’s gonna be a good season.”
“Ricardo is a great talent, who has an international reputation,” said Groningen technical director Mark-Jan Fledderus. “At the beginning of this month his name was mentioned to us and we have already had a conversation with him. Shortly afterwards his situation at Augsburg changed and his arrival seemed no longer an option for us. Until yesterday. We acted very quickly on this and last night Ricardo drove to Groningen to complete his transfer today.”
The move comes at a critical time for Pepi’s USMNT hopes. The competition for potential strikers on Gregg Berhalter’s roster for the World Cup is suddenly fierce, while Pepi’s candidacy has fallen off. Since making the jump from FC Dallas to Augsburg, Pepi hasn’t scored a goal at club level, and his last goal with the national team came back in October of last year.
Even with that drought and the addition of Bosnian striker Ermedin Demirovic as a new starter, Pepi had still appeared in every Augsburg match this season. However, he had clearly become a second-choice option for head coach Enrico Maassen, even with Augsburg generally playing with two strikers. So far this year, Pepi has 107 minutes spread across five appearances in all competitions, and only one start.
In that regard, a move to Groningen and the notoriously free-scoring Eredivisie makes sense. For one thing, Groningen needs the help: they’ve scored five goals in four games this season. It’s also a league where Americans have scored plenty of goals, going back to the days of Michael Bradley at Heerenveen and Jozy Altidore at AZ.
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