Scouting Report: Darlington Nagbe

Darlington Nagbe isn't the most renowned pair of words in the English language, but he's quickly becoming one of the best players in the United States. The 26-year-old midfielder flirted with a move to Scottish giants Celtic all winter long until reports came in that Celtic and Portland could not agree a fee for the player. Nagbe has since announced that he wants to stay with Portland for the remainder of his contract which ends at the end of the 2019 season.

Nagbe is a Liberian-born football player who gained American citizenship in 2015 and has been playing with the USMNT since. Why is it important that I keep mentioning that he is Liberian? His father, Joe Nagbe, is a Liberian football legend and has been the assistant manager of the national team since 2010. Darlington Nagbe and his father have a truly amazing story that not many people can relate to. When Darlington was just five months old, he was forced to leave his home country due to the civil war. Nagbe left with his mother and his older brother, leaving his father behind. Fortunately, Joe Nagbe was able to leave the country when AS Monaco offered him a contract along him with fellow Liberian great, George Weah. Joe bounced around Europe, playing for many teams and always taking his family with him until they finally settled into Cleveland, Ohio when Darlington was 11 years old.

As you can tell, Darlington had a rather unusual childhood which never allowed him to join any academies. Darlington learned all about the beautiful game simply watching his father, which may be why he is such a family man. When invited to a training camp for the United States in 2016, he turned down the offer because he wanted to go home and see his family back in Liberia. A truly admirable thing to do from a family perspective, right? However, it did not go over well with then-US manager Jürgen Klinsmann. Many thought Nagbe would never put on a USMNT kit again. Luckily for Nagbe, the US have moved on from Klinsmann, and Nagbe has to try to win over new manager Bruce Arena.

Scouting Report