Scoring five goals and assisting on another four would be a heck of a season for any 19-year-old lucky enough to be playing professional soccer.
For Diego Fagundez, it was a step back.
The young New England Revolution attacker set the bar so high as an 18-year-old in 2013, posting 13 goals and seven assists in 2013, that there may have been no place to go but down. But Fagundez’s 2014 season, which ended with him losing his spot in the starting lineup, has led to questions about when he will rediscover his previous, scintillating form.
“He’s still a very young player, and this is all part of the process and the maturation that he’s going to go through,” New England general manager Mike Burns says. “It’s normal for there to be some ups and downs. We try to manage that as best we can and not put high expectations on him. But when you go out and score a bunch of goals as an 18-year-old, it’s hard to manage those expectations all of the time.”
It wasn’t all bad for Fagundez last year.
The speedy midfielder scored two goals in a 5-0 rout of the Seattle Sounders on May 11, followed by a goal apiece in each of the club’s next two matches.
But he was held scoreless in his next 16 matches, and partway through that stretch Revs head coach Jay Heaps shifted Teal Bunbury from the frontline to the wing, creating a logjam of talented midfielders looking for playing time.
“I couldn’t find the net and was kind of struggling,” Fagundez said. “Then the team started doing well, and once that happens, it’s hard to get back into the game.”
He started just seven of the Revs' last 16 games while subbing into six and not appearing in three. He did not see the field at all during New England’s playoff run to the MLS Cup title game.
“Teams were now preparing for him a little bit more; they were game-planning against him,” Heaps says. “So he wasn’t finding his own space. He wasn’t finding as much time near the goal as he had the year before.”
Yet it was during last season that he made an impression that would set up a perfect offseason opportunity – in spite of the struggles.
Having played with Uruguay's U-20 national team as an 18-year-old (he did not make the squad for the 2013 FIFA U-20 World Cup), Fagundez was once again called up to Uruguay’s U-20 national team last August. He was then
invited to join the team for the South American Youth Championship in January
, which Uruguay hosted. Fagundez's playing time during that tournament was again limited, but his experiences were vast as he and his teammates finished third to qualify for this spring's FIFA U-20 World Cup, to be played May 30-June 20 in New Zealand.
“The experience was awesome and one that not a lot of people get to live,” Fagundez says. “I got to live that. I stayed sharp during the offseason, worked out, got better. That’s the one thing I can tell from the preseason is that I’m in shape, and I’m ready to go. It’s a different me, and now I have to keep moving forward.”
That hasn’t been lost on his club coaches, either.
“I think Diego has come out of it in a great way,” Heaps says of Fagundez's offseason experience. “He’s in a good place, physically, coming off that Uruguayan tournament. Mentally, you can see his maturity. His attitude has been spot-on; he’s fighting for everything, and it shows.”
Representing Uruguay at the U-20 level meant that Fagundez, who was born in Uruguay and has lived in the United States since age 5, is not longer eligibile for the US national team. That eliminated one unnecessary distraction that had hounded him since he started making waves as a youngster: to which country would he declare his soccer allegiance?
“It’s one of those things that it’s nice that I’ve already committed to something,” Fagundez says. “I’ve been waiting for the chance for a while. To have it in my hands, it’s great. It’s just the beginning. If I keep playing well with the Revs and move forward, get called up into the tournaments and hopefully keep moving on to play with the first [team].”
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Having just turned 20 but already entering his fifth professional season, Fagundez is considered a seasoned veteran, despite his age. And he conducts himself as such. He cordially answers on matters of being benched or of his international status. He also says he ignores the hype and rumors of international clubs that may or may not be knocking on his door, leaving the business aspect to his father, Washington Fagundez, who was also a professional soccer player in his native Uruguay.
“It’s something I don’t really talk about,” Fagundez says. “If anything, I’m not the one they need to approach. I don’t have any pressure. I just have to keep doing my job and have my dad deal with anything if there is stuff going on.”
Most importantly for Fagundez, he knows that nothing will be given to him, despite his past accolades. The situation in the Revolution midfield did not get any less congested, so he knows it will be a dogfight to return to the starting lineup.
“He’s come in with the right mentality,” Heaps says. “We challenged him in the offseason, and I’m really happy with the way he’s prepared himself. We feel there is depth at a lot of different positions, players for fighting for each spot. Nothing has been determined yet. The way I look at it, starting role, off the bench, it doesn’t matter: When you come in the game, you impact it.”
After a highly productive offseason, Fagundez appears to be poised to scrap for, and take advantage of, every minute he earns.
“Everyone has to fight for those positions, no matter where you are,” Fagundez says. “It’s part of the game. If you don’t have someone pushing you from the back, you’re not going to get better. It’s a matter of how much work I put in and how much I get better, and that’s the most important thing.”
