With the background of enemy fans singing “Aarp”, a reference to a non -profit organization that was once known as the American pensioner Association, former National Men’s National Team Sacha Kljestan’s player performed to punish the Moines Menace, an amateur team who took part in the first round of the US Open Cup in the 57th minute.
The day is a 39 -year -old prominent analyst for MLS On Apple TV, regularly discussing on the weekend rounds of the league matches he once played. But the former was the former New York Red Bulls All-star with red and black set and inserting the ball into the back of the net against Sporting Kansas CityReserves, giving its club the fourth division leading 1-0 during the cold Battle of March.
Kljestan, who would continue the score of another punishment in the eventual victory of 2-1, was not the only engaging name for the threat.
From the initial XI, who had eight retirement professionals, he had nine extensive experience with MLS. Including Kljestan there were other star stars such as Matt Hedges, Ozzie Alonso, Benny Feilhaber, Dax McCarty and Bradley Wright-Phillips. Alonso, McCarty and Wright-Phillips, as Kljestan, are also recognizable accessories in the football world like Apple TV Mls.
And with those awnings who have joined the Usl League Two team, des Moines is now until the second round of the longest football tournament in the country. But why threat?
In the script directly from Hollywood, it is advisable for the story to start in southern California.
At the beginning of 2024, Kljestan worked at the Newport Beach gym, co -owned by former des Moines Matt Bourne. One day the group of Bourne’s friends in the city of Iowy, which now included the CEO of the club, who decided to take advantage of the chance.
“I’m sure he had this crazy plan all the time. I thought he was half joke when he said,” Go out of retirement, just play with us in an open cup, “said Kljestan, who would play two games last year, along with several other former professionals. brought Kljestan back-and other friends.
“We decided to start it this year, but we decided to do it, we’ll go out.”
He moved Feilhaber, who was invited to join last year, but could not call Sporting KC 2 because of his coaching role, the proposal was to call a number of important names. When Kljestan announced the first strengthening, Des Moines suddenly became speaking in American football after revealing his lengthy list of former all-stars.
For many distance watching, there was an excitement that legends re -intervened their shoes, but also some confusion why they decided to do it.
“We have one more chance to play a real game with some betting on the line,” Kljestan said. “Benny (Feilhaber) and I have known each other for so long, but we never had to play so many games in our career because we always competed for a national team and the same with Dax McCarty.
Through their connections, the ball started, among other things, with the introduction of Alonso and Wright-Phillips.
“I was blessed by a lot of former national team boys, a bunch of former professionals … It was a really good experience for me as a manager, because for two teams we just don’t have the availability of a player at this time of year,” said Chief Coach Charlie Latshaw III.
Since the season league League 2025 will not start until May, at this point of the year it would often be assembled on the amateur side, which is often on the amateur side. So in the step MLS icon, but as unpaid amateurs.
“No contract,” said Kljestan, who said he was not planning to play outside the American Open Cup. “We’re not paid. That was it, so the registration process was quite easy.”
What was not so simple is a training with training. Work and family duties caused things to be challenging, let alone the fact that players fly from 15 different states. According to Latshaw, this meant only two complete training sessions before their first round-match against Sporting Kansas City 2 19 March. Only one full training is on books before playing the second open cup game des Moines on Wednesday.
“We fly, spend 36 to 48 hours in the hotel together and we are a little bond and make some different things from the field,” Latshaw said. “But it’s definitely sprint when we’re there, some of them are about young boys who learn the names of old boys. I shouldn’t call them old people, but yeah, I think they’re football conditions.”
How talented and experienced as his “old boys” are, many have passed a lengthy time without attending an official match.
“Oh, it’s not easy at all,” Feilhaber said. “Being stopped for five years, it will be problematic … I definitely went on some runs and some interval runs and what I could build fitness.”
Looking at Wednesday’s match against Union Omaha, the match of last year’s departure for Des Moines, some of the younger players are expected to take over. For various reasons, former professionals like Justin Meram, AJ Delagarza and Donny Toia will not be available.
“We will have a much more balanced team in this next game, and if we were to win and go further, I think it would be more balanced,” Feilhaber said. “We want (young boys) to potentially impress someone who follows.”
This is a message that has been repeated.
While many pensioners play for fun, or in the case of Feilhaber, so his children could watch him play, the by-product of this project is to lead and promote a handful of non-PROS in the team. Other names with MLS experience, such as Hedges or Tommy Thompson, are still looking for new professional contracts.
“One thing that has always told me as a player, you never know who is looking,” Kljestan said. “It would be really a dream for me if a player like Leroy (Enzugus) or we had another child who came into the game, Yoshi (OKAWA), who was also fantastic. They are looking for professionals waiting for their opportunity.
Latshaw agreed to send a sentiment and emphasized the platform that these players now have.
“We still have five guys in the group who will participate (in the normal season), and this people do not speak that we have some people we show,” he said. “Whether it’s Cade Hagan, Yoshi Okawa, Kyle Owen, Enzo Carvalho or Leroy Enzugusi.”
For Enzugusi, who trains local children in Des Moines through his Tekkers football program, which co -founded, this experience was invaluable.
“It’s a pretty strange moment with my role in the community just because I am beneficial with players, I have to tell them what (Kljestan) is saying,” said Enzugusi, who was developed Nashville sc In 2021, but never appeared. “I have to tell them what it is like to make a mistake, what it is like to make a mistake. Like all these things I wish I knew than I went to Nashville. I wish I had this experience before I was developed, I would be much better for it.”
On Wednesday, on Wednesday’s Open Cup Game, which will be hosted by des Moines, Enzugusi expects more than 100 players to take part in the match. Latshaw believes that it will appear between 3,000 and 5,000 fans and give the club another source of income. There is also a prospect of taking homes of $ 50,000, awarded the club, which proceeds the farthest of every lower division.
“If we can win (money) for them, it would be amazing,” Kljestan said.
Whether this journey ends on Wednesday or continues to the next round, all participants are soaked in the magic that these legends see that these legends have hit the field at least once again.
“I first played with (Kljestan) and I was just, honest, I was just shooking. I was impressed. How is the guy so old, so slow, but he’s better as kilometers than everyone else on the pitch? “Their smoothness and look so effortless when they shoot and make their first touches and pass the ball, and are so deceitable, unpredictable.”
And if these unpredictable moments lead to victory on Wednesday?
“We have several other names in books that potentially want to appear if we can get through the second round and we just see how it goes,” Latshaw said. “It’s one of those things, it’s a Wild West for the Open Cup for two teams.”
