Two years ago, the Bundesliga website ran an article titled “Why do Wolfsburg have so many young Americans?”
In it, no fewer than four top American prospects were mentioned: Ulysses Llanez, Michael Edwards, Bryang Kayo and Kobe Hernandez-Foster.
All four of them teenagers. All four U.S. youth internationals. And now, two years later, all four of them are gone.
It is through that lens that we must now analyze the situation another top American prospect, Kevin Paredes, is experiencing at the club. It was only this January when Wolfsburg paid D.C. United over $7 million to sign the teenage left back, who had already been called into the U.S. senior national team.
But Paredes has played just 13 total minutes for Wolfsburg thus far. Worryingly, the 19-year-old wasn’t even named to the matchday squad for the club’s first two Bundesliga games this season.
Wolfsburg has been a successful destination for at least one American in the recent past. John Brooks left the club at the end of last season after five years in which he was usually a starter.
But things haven’t gone as well recently when Wolfsburg has signed up-and-coming young Americans, rather than those already established in the German top flight.
As another young American struggles to break through, the situation at Wolfsburg is worth reviewing.