This youth soccer club produced a World Cup star, showing its players ‘anything is attainable’
· Yahoo Sports
The sun was setting on the soccer field at Essex County Riverfront Park in Newark, directly across the Passaic River from Sports Illustration Stadium in Harrison, the official NY/NJ World Cup ’26 Jersey Fan Hub.
An under-15 team of the Salvation Army Ironbound Soccer Club was working out on the turf field as faint cheers occasionally wafted over the water from the stadium, where fans were watching Brazil play Scotland on a 60-foot screen on June 24.
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Each cheer was a likely indicator that something good had just happened for Brazil, easily the fan favorite in that soccer-rich corner of Northern New Jersey and the game’s eventual 3-0 winner.
And like the cheers emanating from the stadium, the excitement of World Cup action has spread to the Ironbound Soccer Club — whose sponsor’s name is often dropped — one of the state’s largest and most competitive youth sports organizations, with 1,200 players, ages 3 to 18, the best of them being legitimate contenders for professional careers.
“It’s in the air, everybody’s focused on it,” said Carlos Sabastian Landeo, 13, a midfielder with the club who lives in Elizabeth, Newark’s neighbor to the south. “It’s just fun. Something to get your head out of stress or anything, and just enjoy the game.”
Carlos Sebastian Landeo, 13, of Elizabeth, is a midfielder in the Salvation Army Ironbound Soccer Club, one of New Jersey’s biggest youth sports organizations. He's seen here at a practice in Newark on Wednesday, June 24, 2026.Ian Peters | For NJ.comLandeo and teammate Nathan Mayor Torres, 14, who lives in the heavily Portuguese and Brazilian Ironbound neighborhood, play on another U-15 team within the club for the most elite players their age.
That team and others for older players are part of Major League Soccer’s NEXT program, affiliated with the New York/New Jersey Red Bulls, the pro team that plays its home games at the Harrison stadium, formerly known as Red Bull Arena.
Indicative of the Ironbound club’s level of play, the 100 or so MLS NEXT programs around the country are meant to provide a pipeline for extraordinary players up to 18 years old to progress toward college play, their affiliated Major Leage Soccer franchises, or other professional or semi-pro teams.
Carlos and Nathan are just two Ironbound club players who aspire to play professionally, and the proximity of the World Cup — with the final eight matches being played just a couple of exits up the New Jersey Turnpike in East Rutherford — has only fueled their ambition.
“It inspires me, it makes me feel like anything is possible,” Nathan said.
“It feels great,” he said. Using the global term for soccer, he added, “Watching pro fútball is really inspiring for young players.”
Nathan Mayo Torres, 14, of Newark, left winger in the Salvation Army Ironbound Soccer Club, named for the East Ward neighborhood where he lives. He's seen here at practice in Newark on Wednesday, June 24, 2026.Ian Peters | For NJ.comPaul Almeida, an alumnus of the Ironbound club, who coaches the U15 team that was working out last week, said there could hardly be better motivation for young players than having soccer’s biggest event played at their doorstep.
“We talk about it all the time,” Almeida said. “When I get in, I’m like, ‘Hey, did you see the game?’ It’s really cool.”
Many of the club’s players are from immigrant families, some are immigrants themselves, so Almeida devised a lesson in how diversity and unity can go hand in hand that also reflected the international nature of the tournament.
“The day that the World Cup started, I actually thought it would be a good idea to have everyone come in their home-country jersey,” Almeida said.
“Some players were wearing, like, Argentina, Portugal,” he said. “I’m born here but my background’s Portuguese. Someone was wearing a Morocco jersey. Ecuador, Columbia. It was great. I was like, ‘Hey, look at us here. We’re so diverse, yet we’re here for the same thing: to play under one team.’”
For the overwhelming majority of Ironbound players, the benefits they are most likely to take away from the program include an appreciation for academics, sportsmanship, commitment, and self-discipline, rather than a pro contract.
But for truly gifted players and as a source of pride and motivation for others, the club can point to a list of alumni who went on to play for domestic and overseas teams, including Red Bulls defender John Tolkin, Portuguese Women’s National Team member Ariana Ruela, and probably the most notable former club member at this particular moment, Tyler Adams.
A young Tyler Adams, right, seen playing in an undated photograph on a Salvation Army Ironbound Soccer Club youth team in Newark against an unidentified player. Adams, who plays professionally, was selected by the U.S. Men's National Team as a midfielder for the 2026 World Cup, his second after 2022.Salvation Army Ironbound Soccer ClubAdams, a former Red Bull player now with AFC Bournemouth in the English Premier League, is a midfielder on the U.S. Men’s National Team now competing in the World Cup.
He played an even more prominent role in the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, where he captained the U.S. team as a 22-year-old in his tournament debut.
Hailing from Wappingers Falls in Upstate New York, Adams is often cited as having played with Red Bulls Academy in Whippany before joining the pro team.
But as an adolescent, he also played with the Ironbound club, and the club’s leaders produced photos from about 15 years ago showing the young Adams wearing his Ironbound team kit during a game and posing with teammates.
Aspiring pros are hardly the only teens excited that the World Cup is happening so close by.
Members of the Boys & Girls Club of Newark got 10 of the 250 free tickets that Gov. Mikie Sherrill announced would be distributed to youth groups earlier this month. They’ll be at Tuesday night’s round-of-32 matchup pitting Sweden against France at the Meadowlands.
“Honestly, I’m really excited,” said Precious Aknyele, 18, of Newark, who’s spending her last summer as a Boys & Girls Club member before heading to Temple University this fall. “I am Nigerian, and soccer — fútball — is a very big thing. My two brothers are going, and they’re very excited.”
As a large soccer organization based close to Sports Illustrated Stadium, the Ironbound club was given a formal role by FIFA, soccer’s international governing body, to run the activities in the Fan Zone just outside the stadium.
On Friday night, before Spain’s 1-0 win over Uruguay was streamed on the big screen inside, Ironbound coaches encouraged fans to kick Velcro-covered soccer balls at a giant dartboard.
Nearby, in what seemed to be a nod to the Jersey Shore, three huge Skee-Ball alleys with soccer ball-sized holes stood unplayed, with no balls, coaches, or fans nearby.
In the closest thing to actual soccer, Ironbound coaches loosely refereed 4-on-4 pickup games on a tiny turf pitch surrounded by a chain-link fence. Fans were clearly having fun, but the fully-inflated balls constantly sailed over the fence into the rest of the zone, halting the otherwise fast-paced action.
Ironbound coach Rui Rosete, who was policing the pickup games, said the level of play was “very good, but it could also be bad.”
The Ironbound club’s president, Nick Lavrador, said in a phone interview that one perk for his young players was getting to meet the Brazilian Men’s National Team at the Red Bull’s training facility.
“That was incredible,” Lavrador said.
“It gives the kids that we serve and that we coach an opportunity to dream that it’s not too big, that anything is attainable,” Lavrador said of the club’s ties to soccer’s global extravaganza.
“And you can get there, and you can reach those goals if a guy like Tyler Adams comes out of the Tri-State area and he’s going into his second World Cup,” he said. “And we were a part of his journey.”
Ironbound Soccer Club Coach Paul Almeida, who played with the club, at Kearny High School, and elsewhere, gauged the pressure on a ball as he watched his under-15 team practice at the Essex County Riverfront Park soccer field in Newark on June 24, 2026. Ian Peters | For NJ.comRead the original article on NJ.com. Add NJ.com as a Preferred Source by clicking here.