But that was then. This is now.
Adi arrived in Ohio in exchange for $1,000,000 in allocation money. He was the first Designated Player in FC Cincinnati’s short MLS history and his salary is huge. There was no confusion about why the free-scoring forward was coming to Ohio. To score goals. He failed to score in three starts, before injuring his ankle in FC Cincy’s home opener against his old club, the Portland Timbers. Subbed off at the half of that game, the injury proved worse than expected and was compounded by a traffic stop by the Ohio Highway Patrol which clocked Adi going over 100 MPH, under the influence, and without a valid driver’s license. As per MLS’s drug and alcohol policy, the striker had to stay away from the game for several weeks and missed three league games. Now back, and finally fully recovered from his ankle injury, it’s time for Adi to get back to business.
When things go wrong in real life, players can find solace on the field. It’s a feeling Adi’s familiar with. Born and raised in Benue State, a remote area of Central Nigeria, he didn’t have much growing up. “It’s not like Lagos there,” said the striker, who was raised by his mother and his grandmother. “It’s a whole different story where I was a kid. I grew up playing in the streets. My Mother would send me on errands and I would just run off and go play football. I got in big trouble for that.”
Those loose and long-ago games in the roadside dust are a far cry from Major League Soccer. “We had no shoes. Think of that. We didn’t even have a ball,” said Adi, whose first pair of boots came from America – were not made for soccer – and had sharp metal spikes. “We bundled up a bunch of socks and tied it all together with a rope and this is what we used as a ball. This is how it all started.”
