Born in Nigeria, a soccer star grows in Brooklyn.
Yussuf Olajde doesn’t play for one of the area’s elite U.S. Soccer academy teams, and he has yet to step on the field for Sheepshead Bay High School, but the 16-year-old prodigy is considered by some experts as New York’s top soccer talent.
“There’s nobody in New York City who can compare to him,” said one Division I coach. “He’s got the most talent — the speed, technique and power that you can’t find in other players who are playing in the academy right now. He’s a hidden gem.”
Hidden is right. Olajde plays for the Brooklyn Italians, whose home base is John Dewey HS on Avenue X in Gravesend. A year ago, Olajde was living a simple life in Lagos, Nigeria, but his father wanted more for his only son.
Olajde arrived in Chicago last summer with about 20 talented, young soccer players. A few stayed and earned a spot in the Chicago Fire’s academy, while others returned to Nigeria. Olajde spent a month in Chicago, living with close friend Kabiru Adewunmi, before moving to Canarsie to live with his uncle, Oladipupo Orimogunje.
In April, Adewunmi was shot and killed as he and a few teammates walked to a convenience store following a Chicago Bulls playoff victory. The gunman was never apprehended.
“We were in the same academy, we stayed in the same room,” Olajde said. “He’s a good friend of mine. I miss him.”
According to Orimogunje, Olajde’s transition to life in the U.S. has been a difficult one.
“It’s been a culture shock, but he has a strong ambition for what he wants to do,” Orimogunje said.
What Olajde wants to do is play professional soccer and, by all indications, that’s a strong possibility.
“The kid is talented, he’s the real deal,” Brooklyn Italians director Joe Barone said. “At his age, he has a plan for himself, already a vision for himself. He’s very focused. I think he’s pro material. What makes him stand out at this level is his maturity to play with men.”
That’s what Olajde does every week, competing with the Brooklyn Italians club in the National Premier Soccer League, where Olajde more than holds his own against players six to seven years older.
Against the Red Bulls U-23 team, he had a goal and an assist in a 4-2 win at NJIT June 22 and came off the bench Saturday in a 3-0 victory, which helped the Italians move into a tie for first place in the Northeast-Atlantic Conference.
“He’s playing against some of the best college players, and future pro players, and when he came . . . he changed the game because of his speed, his ability to keep defenders on their toes because he can run right at them or he can change direction,” Barone said Saturday. “A lot of players don’t have that.”
Barone called Real Salt Lake president Bill Manning, a Massapequa, L.I., native who won a Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup with the Brooklyn Italians in 1991, to ask about sending Olajde to the RSL-AZ Academy in Casa Grande, Ariz. But that plan was scrapped when Barone said the Red Bulls wouldn’t forfeit their territorial rights to Olajde.
Yesterday, Olajde arrived in Bradenton, Fla., where he will spend three days at the prestigious IMG Academy, a full-time residency program that has helped launch the professional careers of DaMarcus Beasley, Michael Parkhurst and Eddie Gaven.
If he doesn’t stay there, Olajde will return to Brooklyn and said he plans on playing this fall for Sheepshead Bay, where he immediately will be the PSAL’s top player. Olajde already has drawn serious interest from Adelphi and St. John’s, as well as other Division I programs, and hopes one day to make a living playing soccer, like his idol, Inter Milan great Samuel Eto’o.
“I dream to become a professional player,” Olajde said. “My mother doesn’t want me to play because she’s scared I might break my leg, but it is my dream. I love soccer.”