It has been a difficult two years for Freddy Adu

It has been a difficult two years for Freddy Adu, but his clutch performance in limited action shows he might finally be turning things around.

HOUSTON - After being a part of the crucial 81st-minute goal that sent the United States men’s national team to the Gold Cup final, the emotions of having a chance to turn around 24 months of career uncertainty were obvious on Freddy Adu’s face.

Eyes glistening and his arms held behind his back, he flashed the smile that has followed him since he came on the scene as a 14-year-old teenage prodigy while explaining his joy of being able to once again represent his country.

“It’s been a long road back to playing on the national team and you really have to be prepared if you get that chance to be on the field,” said Adu, who helped set up Clint Dempsey's goal in Wednesday's 1-0 win over Panama. “This is where you want to be, you want to represent your country."

Ironically, the last time that Adu had been called up was during the 2009 edition of the Gold Cup. He scored a goal in the opening match for the U.S. but had to leave the team shortly after due to his club’s request. After that moment, the rest is well documented.

He would spend two years bouncing from team to team, hungry for a chance but unable to win any coach’s complete trust. After all, Adu isn’t known for being the best defender and needs the ball to be effective and conduct the offense. It is risky placing him on the pitch and in a sport where job security for most coaches is non-existent, it is easy to see why most wouldn’t give him playing time.

In a humbling move, Adu finally found a team in Çaykur Rizespor that would commit in him even if it meant he would have to play in the second division of Turkey. Whereas earlier in his career when Adu likely wouldn’t have made that choice, his maturation as a person and a player has allowed him to put things into perspective. U.S. head coach Bob Bradley admits that decision was a key factor in deciding to call him up to the national team.

“Freddy has been on the national team a number of times. In some of those situations, it didn’t go as well as he had hoped,” said Bradley. “When you see a player go to the second division in Turkey to keep things going in his career, that tells you something,”

Selecting Adu presented a huge risk for Bradley. As over 450,000 followers on twitter can attest, he is still one of most popular soccer players in the world despite having a fair share of struggles in his career recently. Having him on the roster meant that whether or not he played, Bradley would have to constantly answer questions about his decision.

After the 53-year-old coach decided not to play Adu in the match against Spain in a friendly earlier this month, the questions on why he would select a player who couldn’t even get on the roster in a meaningless exhibition match arose. Bradley admitted then that he wanted to see how far Adu had come along.

“When we put together this roster, we felt like this was the time for us to reassess where Freddy was in all of this,” said Bradley after the 4-0 loss to Spain. “He didn’t get put on the roster in all honesty…with expectation that he was ready to play a big role at this time.“

After that game, Adu wouldn’t make the U.S. roster throughout the group stage matches. The team struggled its way to the knockout stages and it looked like the last person that Bradley would put faith was Adu. Then a breakthrough happened.

On the bench against Jamaica in the quarterfinal match sat the 22-year-old. He didn’t get into the match but it signaled that there had been a change in Bradley’s thought process. Finally with the Gold Cup final in the balance, the coach turned to Adu to ignite the offense and break the deadlock against Panama in the semifinal. Adu said that Bradley’s instructions were simple.

Bradley revealed that even though Adu came into the Gold Cup training camp with the right attitude, his level of performance wasn’t up to the international level of play.

“I didn’t say this earlier but he didn’t start out this camp great,” Bradley explained. “There were days early on where he needed to regain confidence and the speed of training. There were a lot of days where it didn’t go great. You could see over time that it was starting to get better and better.”

Adu’s said that all of his teammates were very supportive of him throughout the tournament and were effusive in their praise when he contributed to the team’s win. Star midfielder Landon Donovan believes that Adu understands how important it is for his career development to perform well when he has a chance to.

“Freddy realizes that this was a big opportunity for him," said Donovan. "His performance tonight was very good at a time where we really needed him."