20230405 American States United

April 05, 2023

“I used to have a Tim Howard 24 shirt. And yeah, that was me in the garden. It was either him or Rooney. I used to choose between the two.”

—Marcus Rashford, on Tim Howard being his childhood idol, from Men in Blazers’ Pep-Rashford-Odegaard Podcast Special 🎧🎙

American Wunderkind in Scotland:

Weston McKennie might be the Baby Eagle with the biggest rep for wizardry — the Harry Potter fan who regularly hits wand celes — but Malik Tillman 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 might be the American Abroad who truly is magic. At least in the opinion of the Ibrox faithful.

Tillman, on loan from Bayern Munich, has six goals in his last six matches for Rangers. Or pull focus a little further and he’s got eight in his last 13. 🤯 This haul includes a brace against Dundee United on Saturday (WATCH: 1st Goal | 2nd Goal). Which had Tillman hitting celebrations that paid homage to his American heritage. 🏈

About those U.S. connex … The 20-year-old USMNT midfielder was born in Nürnberg, Germany, the son of a German mother and a U.S. military father. Tillman then grew up in Fürth, and initially joined the Greuther Fürth youth system, before switching to Bayern Munich at 13. Malik actually isn’t the only one in his family to come up through the Bayern ranks, as his older brother Timothy Tillman, 24, played for the club’s youth academy as well. Timothy, also a midfielder, now plays for LAFC in MLS.

Malik’s future may be at Ibrox, as Rangers are now trying to trigger their $6.3 million purchase clause from Bayern and make the loan deal a permanent move. A pretty big decision considering Rangers’ relatively modest player budget.

Whatever winds up happening, Malik has one of the best supporter songs a USMNT’er in Europe has ever been graced with: a chant based on Pilot’s rock hit from the ‘70s, “Magic”. 🎶🎶 He’s Malik, you know … Give him the ball and he’ll score 🎶🎶

That Train Keeps A Scorin’:

Ricardo Pepi is another Baby Eagle soaring in Europe.

Coming off his stellar back-to-back outings for the USMNT against Grenada and El Salvador — where he scored three goals in two matches — the 20-year-old from El Paso, Texas was back in the goals over the weekend, scoring a low-flying dart against Fortuna Sittard on Sunday (WATCH). De Trein 🚂 now has 10 Eredivisie goals for the season, good enough to be tied for seventh on the league list, just three off the top spot. Impressive, considering that he missed Groningen’s first five matches of the season, along with the fact that the side he’s playing for is second-to-last in the league.

The Augsburg loanee’s attacking prowess hasn’t gone unnoticed by other clubs. According to none other than Fabrizio Romano, Pepi is “100 percent” not returning to his parent club after this season, and is garnering serious interest from top Dutch sides PSV and Feyenoord. Pepi has even had some Premier League clubs inquire about his situation, but according to Fab, he doesn’t want to make England his next career step just yet.

News and Notes:

  • Fresh off his Orlando adventures, top USMNT recruit Folarin Balogun 🇫🇷 (21; Brooklyn, NY) made his way back to France, where he promptly bagged an assist for Reims (WATCH). But has his interest in America cooled? According to USMNT interim manager Anthony Hudson, after the two spent some QT together in Florida, Flo’s only texted a few times since. I’m sure it’s nothing. 😬

  • Weston McKennie 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 and Brenden Aaronson 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 started and were key contributors in Leeds’ impressive 2-1 win over fellow relegation battlers Nottingham Forest on Tuesday. Wes was then the recipient of a Chaka Khan chant. Higher praise from the Yorkshire faithful may not exist.

  • Antonee Robinson 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 (25; Liverpool, ENG) absolutely walloped one off the crossbar at Bournemouth Saturday (WATCH). Not sure a ball can be struck harder than that. 💥

  • After suffering a scary head injury that led to him pulling out of USMNT camp, Tim Weah 🇫🇷 (23; Rosedale, NY) started and played 82 minutes in Lille’s 3-1 win over Lorient on Sunday. 🙌

  • Kevin Paredes 🇩🇪 (19; South Riding, VA) had an assist for Wolfsburg on Saturday (WATCH). That’s one goal and three assists in just 410 minutes of action so far this season.

  • Paxten Aaronson 🇩🇪 (19; Medford, NJ) made his Eintracht Frankfurt home debut against Union Berlin in their German Cup quarter final win on Tuesday. And he was then interviewed about the occasion afterwards.

American-Born Coaches Thriving in Germany:

This is getting ridiculous. Fabian Hürzeler 🇩🇪, the 30-year-old coach born in Houston, TX, has now won all NINE matches in which he’s been in charge at St. Pauli. The most recent win came Saturday over Jahn Regensburg. Read more about Fabian’s perfect start with the second-tier side here.

Meanwhile, Pellegrino Matarazzo 🇩🇪 has a mini two-match winning streak of his own, after he led Hoffenheim to a 2-1 win at Werder Bremen on Sunday. The Columbia grad born in New Jersey has pulled Der Blau out of the relegation spots, after getting off to a slow start with the Southwest German club.

Parting Shots:

Rokas Pukštas 🇭🇷 is at it again. The 18-year-old midfielder born in Stillwater, OK scored his fourth goal of the season for Croatian side Hajduk Split in their 3-2 win at Sibenik on Saturday (WATCH). Pukštas is a Sporting Kansas City Academy product, who’s eligible to play for either the U.S. or Lithuania. Stillwater, meanwhile, hasn’t garnered this much attention since Billy Crudup shredded “Fever Dog” licks in Almost Famous. 🎸

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