Growing up, Justen Glad would regularly mark off boxes on his ongoing checklist of goals on the soccer field. Going to a State Cup final. Winning the USSDA National Championship. Signing his first professional contract. Getting called in to the U.S. U-17 National Team.
Each step along the way, the burgeoning center back has held the humble approach that he has just accomplished “the biggest moment” in his life.
It was no different when he earned his first call-up to the U.S. National Team for January camp last month and now that he has returned to Real Salt Lake still in search of his first cap with the senior national team, he does so with humility and determination.
“It was great and an honor to get called into camp, but not playing … that’s just extra motivation,” he said this week after rejoining RSL for preseason training camp in Tucson, Arizona. “All I can do is work hard and wait for what’s next. It’s my job to prove them wrong and be in the conversation for next year.”
Glad is coming off of something of a breakout season in 2017. With the U.S. U-20 National Team in which he played in multiple roles in helping to win the CONCACAF U-20 Championship for the first time in U.S. Soccer history and in advancing to the quarterfinals of the 2017 FIFA U-20 World Cup. With Real Salt Lake, he battled back from injuries that interrupted the first half of his season in between stints with the U-20s and matured into the top class of center backs in Major League Soccer.
Already with 51 MLS starts and 4,595 minutes under his belt at just 20 years old, the fifth-year veteran is far from content in his place in RSL’s starting lineup, nor his newfound position on the radar for the U.S. National Team. Two years away from the next Olympics and four years away from the next World Cup, those are tournaments he has in his sights, goals that drive him through daily workouts – whether on the field with club and country or in a gym, where not even a vacation to Europe could interrupt his appetite for improvement.
“I think a goal is to always be involved with the national team, no matter what level,” he said of his aspirations for 2018. “I know I need to elevate my game. I know there are things I can improve on and in preseason that’s my focus. Those two, to me, go hand in hand – that if I keep improving, I’ll get called.”
At the most recent camp in Carson, California, a group of mostly MLS players worked together for three weeks before finishing camp with a scoreless draw in a friendly with Bosnia. At that camp, Glad joined with RSL teammates Danny Acosta and Brooks Lennon and U.S. U-20 cohort Tyler Adams of the New York Red Bulls to make up a youth contingent that has a chance to become the core of the roster in years to come.
During the camp, he was able to self-assess along the way and recognize that the players in the camp made up the majority of the MLS-based players he would be competing with over the next few years as he vies for his first cap.
“You’re definitely looking around and thinking these are the guys I have to compete with day in and day out through the MLS season, regardless of what the people in Europe are doing. Those are the guys that are in the pool. That’s the competition,” he said.
Now back in RSL camp, he is focused on continuing the progress he made over the course of the 2017 season. As Real Salt Lake closed out the season on a dramatic upswing, going 8-3-4 over the final 15 matches of the season only to miss the postseason by a single point, he and his teammates are driven and determined to mimic that success from the opening kick on March 4 against FC Dallas.
The goals are lofty, but with a competitive roster under the watch of Head Coach Mike Petke that is growing together with each training session, they come with a sense of realistic expectations.
“My focus and the team’s focus is holding that trophy up at the end of the season,” Glad said. “There are obviously steps to take before that. It’s been disappointing not making the playoffs. So that’s the first box that we have to check off. Individually, I just want to improve every year and play the best soccer I can play to help my team win.”
Along the way, he may find himself checking off a few more boxes on his growing list of biggest moments in his life.
