Has anyone in the history of the world needed a transfer the way Maurice Edu does?
The Sunderland man, once an emerging talent in the U.S. program, is practically in witness protection. I’d be willing to wager one of my favorite garden gnomes that a lot of fans don’t even remember where Edu plays any longer.
The answer to that bit of evolving trivia is “Stoke City,” where he is nominally teammates with Geoff Cameron and Brek Shea. (Well, Shea, who isn’t getting much more attention from the manager Edu, is off to Barnsley on a loan.)
Edu’s career has gone wildly off track; his only regular playing time in the last year and a half came at Bursaspor last spring, where he got 11 games on loan for the Turkish club. Back at Stoke this year, he’s returned unfortunately to the previous forgotten man status.
Don’t forget, Edu was a relatively young 24 when he was named to the U.S. World Cup team in 2010. Heck, he even scored an important goal in the tournament – although it was one that didn’t count. His volley on June 18 against Slovenia was waved off by referee Koman Coulibaly, who saw a foul that nobody else around the planet saw.
A year ago or even a few months ago, we might have said that Edu needs a move elsewhere in Europe or back into MLS – he was quite the valuable figure previously in his days at BMO Field with Toronto – in order to get any World Cup roster consideration.
Now we’re past that; it’s probably too late for him to squeeze somehow back into Jurgen Klinsmann’s plans for Brazil.
What we’re talking about now is getting his career moving in a good direction again. Clearly, it’s not going to happen at Stoke. Two managers have now, for whatever reason, dismissed the former Rangers man as irrelevant to their plans.
He has to get moving – the sooner the better. Would a spring spent wasting away in Stoke City’s reserve do one bit of good for the man?