http://www.topdrawersoccer.com/club-soccer-articles/pro-prospects:-man-city-after-us-youth_aid28062
Jonathan Lama inspires with perseverance
No path to European soccer is easy, but Jonathan Lama may have followed the one with the most resistance.
The teenager is currently in Croatia training in Dinamo Zagreb’s Academy, but his path was full of detours.
Lama was born in Bogota, Colombia, but moved to Bologna, Italy by the age of two to live with his father’s family. At six, he moved back to Colombia.
“Anyone that has lived in Bogota knows that it's not easy living there when you have to watch who's walking behind you all the time,” Lama told TopDrawerSoccer.com “And I lived in a part where you would see a lot of poverty but I think living in cities like this makes you mentally stronger.”
When he was 13 years old, he moved to Naples, Florida, which in turn started this part of his soccer journey.
Lama caught on with a local club called the Naples Sharks. Dr. Josef Schultz spotted him while playing with the Sharks, and asked Lama to join the Schultz Academy, which he attributes much of his success so far to the training he received there.
“He was also one of the essential trainers in my life,” Lama said of Schulz. “And most of the things I do here in training are things I did with Schulz in Boca like a lot of possession and small sided games.”
Charting the journey to Europe from there does not get any easier.
A bit of luck and good timing inspired Lama to attend the open tryouts for Alianza de Futbol in Miami in 2011, where he advanced past thousands of other players to the final game in Los Angeles.
He was spotted by agents and scouts for Dinamo Zagreb during the final competition, and was offered a spot to join the Croatian club’s Academy then.
He temporarily declined in order to finish school, but another opportunity came knocking for Lama before he knew it.
Nike set up a competition called The Chance to find undiscovered talent around the world earlier this year. Lama was one of four players from the United States to make the cut for all-expenses paid trip to Barcelona.
Unfortunately, bad luck sidelined Lama on only the second day of training in Spain when he suffered an ankle injury.
“I appreciate the whole experience and it’s great that Nike has this type of program where you don’t have to pay anything to get exposure. I still keep in touch with the Nike academy coach.
“Also just from being there some more agents got my info and one had really good options and told me to stay in Europe that he would have a team for me in a week.”
The youngster took the agent at his word, but nothing panned out. Eight months after declining the invite to Dinamo Zagreb, he hopefully sent them an email to see if he could tryout again for the club.
“They've been really good with me,” Lama said. “I’m in the Dinamo house [and] there’s about 14-15 people but only two other Americans in my room. Dinamo is the biggest club in Croatia by a lot but the people here are very humble about everything, which is great.”
Lama is only just training with Dinamo at this point. He says he has offers now to go on trial at Deportivo Cali in Colombia, an Italian club, or in Austrian club with former U.S. youth international Alex Molano.