Soccer federations from England and the USA are fighting over Chelsea teen sensation, Landon Emenalo. The 16-year-old defensive midfielder has dual citizenship with the two nations.
He is currently featuring in the young ranks at Chelsea, where his father, Michael, was previously the director of football.
Emenalo initially made his international debut with the England U15s in early 2023.
The budding star also played three more fixtures with the nation’s U16s later that year. Nevertheless, Emenalo then recently swapped allegiances to the United States U17s. The midfielder made appearances against Germany and Czech Republic youth teams in September.
Despite the switch, England is not giving up on having Emenalo on their side. The Telegraph has reported that England U17 manager Neil Ryan named the youngster in his most recent squad. The English youth team is set to play qualifiers for the Euro 2025 tournament.
Emenalo was born in Arizona while his father began working behind the scenes at Chelsea. Michael Emenalo, a previous Nigerian international, moved to the United States to play college soccer at Boston University.
After furthering his career across Europe, the senior Emenalo was then part of San Jose’s original Major League Soccer team in 1996.
Michael then worked as the director of player development at the Tucson Soccer Academy in 2006 before his move to Chelsea. It was with the Blues where the older Emenalo made a name for himself.
The executive was key in helping the English club sign stars such as Juan Mata, Thibaut Courtois, Kevin De Bruyne, Mohamed Salah, and N’Golo Kante. Michael eventually moved on to be the director of football at Monaco and then held a similar role with the Saudi Pro League.
Landon signed on with Chelsea at the age of eight. This came as his father was still at the helm of the West London club. Although Michael has moved on, Landon remains a key prospect with the Blues. His position with Chelsea could very well boost England’s chances of making the midfielder an official Three Lions players in the future.
Nevertheless, U.S. Soccer could have an ace up its sleeve in the situation. The organization recently hired Mauricio Pochettino to become the manager of the USMNT. The Argentine coach is considered to be a top manager and has worked with several massive clubs in his career. One of these clubs happened to be Chelsea.
Pochettino managed the Blues for the 2023/24 season before stepping away from the team earlier this summer. Despite giving Chelsea a boost, the coach clashed with club executives on a series of issues.
However, Pochettino is likely very aware of Emenalo from his time in West London. U.S. Soccer will almost certainly try to use their Chelsea links in order to help entice Emenalo to officially join their ranks. Youth players do not have to fully commit to an international team until they feature for the actual senior side.
Photo credit: IMAGO / Crystal Pix
