The acclaimed poet and novelist Victor Hugo of “Les Misérables” fame once described perseverance as “the secret of all triumphs.” Though this applies to many facets of life, oftentimes the sports world is full of figures whose “never say die” attitude has been the key to their long-term success, especially when things aren’t always rosy. For New England Revolution midfielder Lee Nguyen, his soccer career is a crystal clear example of what you can accomplish with an outlook that includes never being fazed by adversity.
Perhaps no player on the field will be as crucial to their team’s chances at taking home MLS Cup on Sunday than Nguyen will be and has been all season for the Revs. His exploits this year are a major reason New England has gotten to this point. He finished the regular season with 18 goals, good for fourth best in the league, and finished third in the MLS MVP voting behind only Obafemi Martins of Seattle and Robbie Keane of the team he’ll be facing for all the marbles this weekend, the Los Angeles Galaxy.
Over the course of his nearly nine year professional career, Nguyen has certainly seen his fair share of peaks and valleys. After starring at collegiate powerhouse Indiana for a season, he attracted the attention of Dutch giants PSV Eindhoven and made the move overseas in January 2006. However, in his two seasons with the Eredivisie side he made only two senior-level appearances and found it difficult to break free from the reserve team. After continuously struggling to break into the lineup at PSV, Nguyen joined Danish first division side Randers FC in January 2008. Though he made ten starts and appeared in 22 matches overall in both the 2007-08 and 2008-09 seasons, Nguyen was unable to find the net and only had two assists during his time in Denmark. Randers would finish mid-table in both seasons he played for them. Needless to say, his first three seasons as a professional were not what he had in mind, especially considering the initial excitement associated with joining one of Europe’s most famous clubs.
Upon leaving Indiana, Nguyen was looked at as a possible future US men’s national team regular making a name for himself in European soccer. After a lackluster campaign with a middle of the road Danish team and only a handful of appearances for the US, his career seemed to be taking a similar path to Freddy Adu’s, perhaps the highest profile player there is in terms of promise unfulfilled. Nguyen’s latest change of scenery would take him to the birthplace of his parents, joining Vietnamese side Hoàng Anh Gia Lai in early 2009. There he would rediscover his goal-scoring form and have his best season to date since turning pro, scoring nine goals as the team would finish sixth in the V-League that year. He would continue playing in Vietnam for the next two seasons with another club, Becamex Binh Duong, where he was hampered by recurrent injuries and as such had limited effectiveness.
Despite a lucrative contract offer to remain in Vietnam as the league’s first American player, Nguyen was keen to give MLS a shot beginning in 2012. However, even that move was fraught with a bit of adversity right off the bat. After joining the Vancouver Whitecaps via the allocation ranking, he played in only a few preseason games before being waived by the team. Though it probably didn’t appear so at the time, things were on the precipice of becoming much brighter for the McKinney, TX native when it perhaps looked pretty dark for him.
The Revs would claim him through the Waiver Draft the day after Vancouver let him go and almost immediately, the revival was on. Nguyen would appear in almost every match in 2012, netting five goals and quickly becoming a favorite of the fans who named him team MVP. And on May 12 of that year, boy did he ever stick it to the team that put him on waivers only two months earlier with a goal that, upon viewing it, makes your jaw seem to feel slightly more susceptible to the force of gravity. [youtube id=”fJRUDrvXzNc” width=”620″ height=”360″]
Goals like that have been his calling card in the three seasons he’s been a part of the Revolution as he’s quickly turned into one of the league’s best long-shot artists. Nguyen has certainly demonstrated the fact that he’s not bashful at all about teeing it up from outside the 18-yard box. In fact, many an opposing goaltender has probably gone to sleep after facing New England with the image in his head of a Nguyen blast streaming past him into the back of the net. When you become familiar with where Nguyen has been, it makes you appreciate even more where he currently sits as we speak. 2014 was obviously a breakout season of gargantuan proportions for the marvelous midfielder but there’s still business to attend to on Sunday.
What better way to put a cap on a spectacular season than to hoist the first ever league championship trophy, not just for him as a professional but also for a Revolution franchise that will be appearing in their fifth MLS Cup final, having yet to win one. If the fifth time can somehow be a charm and the league’s third most valuable player can make it happen, the term “Nguyen-ing” will forever be etched into the lexicon of soccer in the Boston area.
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