{"id":14324,"date":"2026-01-30T17:39:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-30T17:39:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/usmnts-alex-freeman-completes-villarreal-transfer-from-orlando\/"},"modified":"2026-01-30T17:39:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-30T17:39:14","slug":"usmnts-alex-freeman-completes-villarreal-transfer-from-orlando","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/usmnts-alex-freeman-completes-villarreal-transfer-from-orlando\/","title":{"rendered":"USMNT&#8217;s Alex Freeman completes Villarreal transfer from Orlando"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"article-meta\"><span class=\"timestamp \">Jan 30, 2026, 07:12 AM ET<\/span><\/div>\n<p>Right back Alex Freeman, a hopeful for this year&#8217;s United States World Cup roster, transferred Thursday to LaLiga club Villarreal from MLS side Orlando City.<\/p>\n<p>A 21-year-old son of former All-Pro wide receiver Antonio Freeman, Alex made his U.S. national team debut in May against Turkey.<\/p>\n<p>Getting playing time while Sergi\u00f1o Dest regained fitness after a torn ACL, Freeman made 13 international appearances and scored twice in a November friendly against Uruguay.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline editorial float-r\" data-behavior=\"article_related\">\n<h2 class=\"editorial-title\">Editor&#8217;s Picks<\/h2>\n<p>2 Related<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Freeman finished third in voting for the U.S. Soccer Federation Male Player of the Year.<\/p>\n<p>On Thursday, U.S. men&#8217;s national team coach Mauricio Pochettino said he was optimistic about Freeman&#8217;s move.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I am not worried. I am not concerned about if some players are going to move in that transfer window because always, what I expect [is] the best thing and for sure, always for me it&#8217;s important that the player feel happy, feel comfortable,&#8221; Pochettino said.<\/p>\n<p>Pochettino said that he spoke to Freeman ahead of the move.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If that happens, it is because they want to improve, they want to grow and I think it&#8217;s an amazing challenge that we need to support and help and to adapt in the best possible way.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He played his first MLS match for Orlando on April 29, 2023, entering in second-half stoppage time. He had two more substitute MLS appearances in 2024, totaling 10 minutes, then took over as starting right back last season from Dagur Th\u00f3rhallsson.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2025%2F1119%2Fr1577495_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=570&amp;format=jpg, https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2025%2F1119%2Fr1577495_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=1140&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2025%2F1119%2Fr1577495_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=375, https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2025%2F1119%2Fr1577495_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=750&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Alex Freeman scored six goals for Orlando last year.\u00a0<cite>Dustin Markland\/USSF\/Getty Images<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Freeman scored six goals in 29 league matches for Orlando last year. He was selected to the MLS All-Star team and was voted MLS Young Player of the Year.<\/p>\n<p>Orlando said it will receive a sell\u2011on percentage if Freeman makes a future move.<\/p>\n<p>Now 53, Antonio played nine seasons in the NFL, making the All-Pro team in 1998 and winning the 1997 Super Bowl with the Green Bay Packers.<\/p>\n<p><em>Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jan 30, 2026, 07:12 AM ET Right back Alex Freeman, a hopeful for this year&#8217;s United States World Cup roster, transferred Thursday to LaLiga club Villarreal from MLS side Orlando City. A 21-year-old son of former All-Pro wide receiver Antonio Freeman, Alex made his U.S. national team debut in May against Turkey. Getting playing time [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14325,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_daextam_enable_autolinks":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football-transfers"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/r1577495_1296x729_16-9.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}