EUGENE, Ore. — Football is a family affair for the Flowers brothers. They just differ on the definition.
Benji, now 15, will join the Premier League team when he turns 18. With the Dallas academy since he was 10, Benji made his debut with Dallas’ MLS Next Pro team, North Texas SC, this year. He has played for the U.S. under-15 team and has scored two goals in three appearances this year.
Until then, he’ll continue to work on his game in Texas. He became the youngest player to sign a professional contract with the senior team as a homegrown player in late July. “Well, he was way bigger than me, and also I think that he could take hits more, way more than me, and he was like twice my weight, twice my height, like around my age. “So I played soccer as well growing up when I was younger. But then I got bigger and I was too physical and getting red cards. “But my little brother, I mean, he played soccer. He wasn’t as big as I was, obviously, he was shorter. So then my parents were too scared to put him in football, and he just blossomed and then became really good at soccer. Flowers is also a prospect for the U.S. national team . “When I came back home, he scored five goals in one game. I was like, ‘Oh yeah, this dude’s going pro. And then just seeing it happen just really made me proud, and just happy to see that for him.”
So I think that’s probably why my parents thought it was like really dangerous for me,” Benji Flowers said. ”So they put him in it, and they told me to stick with soccer. So I stopped playing,” Aaron said. MLS Commissioner Don Garber told The Associated Press that the contract with Chelsea shows the league’s push to build up its academy system is paying off. “It’s probably the single-biggest validation of our player-development programs in recent memory, and I’m really excited about it, and I’m proud of it because we’ve been working for a long time and spending enormous resources in improving the player-development programs at our clubs,” Garber said. “I already knew he was really good,” Flowers said.
The Dallas academy has previously produced such U.S. stars as Ricardo Pepi and Weston McKennie, who were both on the roster for this summer’s World Cup.
