{"id":442553,"date":"2026-01-30T07:53:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-30T07:53:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/442553\/"},"modified":"2026-01-30T07:53:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-30T07:53:08","slug":"american-defender-alex-freeman-transfers-to-spains-villarreal-from-orlando-city-of-the-mls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/442553\/","title":{"rendered":"American defender Alex Freeman transfers to Spain’s Villarreal from Orlando City of the MLS"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Canadian Press – Jan 29, 2026 \/ 7:58 pm | Story: 596922<\/p>\n

\t\t<\/p>\n

Photo: The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) \u2014 Right back Alex Freeman, a hopeful for this year’s U.S. World Cup roster, transferred Thursday to Spain’s Villarreal from Major League Soccer’s Orlando City.<\/p>\n

A 21-year-old son of former All-Pro wide receiver Antonio Freeman<\/a>, Alex made his U.S. national team debut in May against Turkey. Getting playing time while Sergi\u00f1o Dest regained fitness<\/a> after a torn ACL, Freeman made 13 international appearances and scored twice in a November friendly against Uruguay<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Freeman finished third in voting<\/a> for the U.S. Soccer Federation Male Player of the Year.<\/p>\n

He played his first MLS match for Orlando on April 29, 2023, entering in second-half stoppage time. He had two more substitute MLS appearances in 2024, totaling 10 minutes, then took over as starting right back last season from Dagur Dan Th\u00f3rhallsson.<\/p>\n

Freeman scored six goals in 29 league matches for Orlando last year. He was selected to the MLS All-Star team and was voted MLS Young Player of the Year.<\/p>\n

Orlando said it will receive a sell\u2011on percentage if Freeman makes a future move.<\/p>\n

Now 53, Antonio played nine seasons in the NFL, making the All-Pro team in 1998 and winning the 1997 Super Bowl with the Green Bay Packers.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP soccer: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/soccer<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Canadian Press – Jan 29, 2026 \/ 7:58 pm | Story: 596922 Photo: The Canadian Press ORLANDO,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":442554,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,561,82],"class_list":["post-442553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442553","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442553"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442553\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/442554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}