Andrew Carleton felt like a pro soccer player for the first time in the days after he signed his professional contract with Atlanta United.
While attending his younger brother's game, he said he was asked to be in more photographs than ever before. There were also a few requests for autographs. No, signing his name isn't something he had practiced.
“It was pretty surreal,” the 16-year-old said in his first interview since singing with the MLS expansion club.
He better get used to the attention.
As Atlanta United's first Homegrown Player, he will receive a lot of attention on the field and off the field as he tries to fulfill what is being tabbed as immense potential as a creative midfielder.
The attention started long ago when he was being pursued by clubs in Europe. He declined to say which ones. Instead, he signed with his hometown club.
“Europe will always be there,” he said. “There wasn’t a team here. When it became possible, I knew that’s what I wanted to do.”
It has continued with his time at the Charleston Battery, Atlanta United’s affiliate in the USL, and with the national teams.
Carleton played for the Battery in a recent exhibition game against Rangers, a power in Scotland. He said those few minutes were more valuable as a teaching tool than anything he experienced in his previous six months.
Rangers featured grown men who were fighting for jobs and not all interested to know if Carleton had bought himself a Beats Pill speaker for his recent birthday, as other people his age might be interested to know.
“It’s not about him getting knocked over,” Charleston coach Mike Anhaeuser said. “It’s just the power and speed. One play he wasn’t able to catch up. But that’s going to happen right now.”
Carleton recognizes that the physical part of the game is his biggest area of improvement. There’s really not a lot he can do to improve in that area other than to continue to grow, and to work on improving his positioning and reading of the game.
His skills on offense are undeniable. Anhaeuser said Carleton can see and complete passes in the field’s final third that players almost twice his age aren’t capable of pulling off. He had a few in the team’s recent 1-0 loss to Nigeria at Silverbacks Park.
“As far as talent, he has those tools,” Anhaeuser said. “Everybody sees it. Now, we have to try to start forming those other pieces.”
Carleton will leave Charleston to participate with the U.S. Under-17 national team in Mexico in August, and then will rejoin the Battery for the final weeks of the season. He thinks the experience of playing in different systems, under different coache and against different levels of talent will quicken his professional development.
Unsurprisingly, Carleton believes he will be able to earn a spot on the first team when Atlanta United wraps up its training camp next year.
He already dreams of the team’s best moment: defeating Robbie Keane, Steven Gerrard and Los Angeles, his favorite MLS team before Atlanta United came online, in the MLS Cup.
“He’s in a good spot,” Anhaeuser said. “They (Atlanta United) will take their time to work with him. Being with us, he can learn those things and be playing a lot of games by the time he’s 20.”
