Injury-plagued Adams ‘fit’ for busy U.S. summer

United States assistant coach B.J. Callaghan said oft-injured midfielder Tyler Adams is “looking fit” ahead of an action-packed summer that includes a pair of June friendlies against Colombia and Brazil, as well as the start of the Copa America later in the month.

Adams missed a large swath of the season with club side Bournemouth due to injury. He underwent his second hamstring surgery in seven months last October that sidelined him until February.

After making a pair of appearances with the USMNT in the Concacaf Nations League in March, he dealt with back spasms. All told, Adams logged just 118 minutes over three appearances at club level this season.

While Callaghan was reluctant to link the back issues to Adams’ appearances in the CNL, he likes what he’s seen so far from the U.S. captain, whose range and tackling make him a vital part of the the Americans’ midfield.

“I can just tell you that [Adams] is in great spirits,” the coach told reporters on a Zoom call as an initial group of 12 players started training in Maryland on Wednesday. “He’s looking fit, he’s here in training and we’ve had a really great partnership with Bournemouth over the last couple weeks to make sure that we’ve developed a plan that’s going to allow him to maximize his performance here throughout the friendlies and Copa.”

U.S. keeper Matt Turner has faced a different set of challenges than Adams, namely getting steady playing time at Nottingham Forest. Turner made just a handful of appearances in 2024 and none after March 1, as he lost his spot in the starting lineup to Matz Sels.

But Turner remains optimistic that his work habits will stand him in good stead with the USMNT.

“I approach training every single day with the same mentality, whether I’m playing or whether I’m not,” he said. “I work really, really hard. I try to get better in every area that I can and just be ready.

“I prepare for games as if I’m going to be playing, as exhausting as that can be; that hope that maybe my name will be on the team sheet for that game, even though when I know probably in the back of my mind it’s not. I prepare like maybe it will be. What if it is?

“So I try to just maintain that level of professionalism every single day, every training session and just keep going and understanding that obviously if I want to keep this shirt here, I’ve got to perform when I come here. So I have to stay engaged, I have to stay ready and focused and driven.”

Turner’s primary competition with the U.S. will come from Ethan Horvath, who as a club teammate of Turner’s at Forest had his own struggles with a lack of playing time during the first half of the season. But a January move to Cardiff City gave Horvath’s club career a boost as he made 16 league appearances.

Yet even as Turner has fought to get back on the field, he still feels he’s improved his game.

“I think I’ve just become overall a lot more adaptive. I’ve had to learn how to do certain things maybe I wasn’t so comfortable with on the fly,” Turner said. “I think I’ve become a lot better at dealing with balls into the area, coming for crosses, defending the space behind my back line as well. And yeah, going through hard times on the pitch sometimes and then having to level out and put in a good performance after.

“I’ve changed so much as a person in my family life, as a player and I’ll just continue to use every experience that I get as fuel to drive me forward and keep getting better and keep being a guy, whether it be a good or a bad experience, that has a smile on my face that guys can look up to.”

Joining Turner and Horvath to begin the camp are defenders Chris Richards and Joe Scally, midfielders Gio Reyna, Malik Tillman and Luca de la Torre, and forwards Brenden Aaronson, Folarin Balogun, Josh Sargent and Haji Wright for what will be the full player pool’s most extended training camp since the 2022 World Cup.

Callaghan said the goal is to “try to solidify a lot of the principles and identity that we want to play with,” with 14 more players are due to report by Sunday.

Gregg Berhalter’s side are in Group C for the Copa America, which will be hosted in the U.S., and begin play against Bolivia on June 23 before taking on Panama on June 27 and Uruguay on July 1 in a bid to reach the knockout round of the tournament.