it Austin FC The season has had some precious results, but the explosion of the local midfielder Owen Wolff is among them. The 18-year-old was established as one of the best teenagers in the world MLS this season, appearing in nearly every Austin game he was available for when he wasn’t out with the United States youth national team at the U-20 World Cup.
Wolff’s progress to earn a starting spot in a crowded Austin midfield during a very disappointing season for the team was made even more complicated by the fact that he is the son of head coach Josh Wolff. This dynamic is subtle and difficult to manage.
“With any new player — I mean, he shares my last name, but that’s not what it’s about — he has to show his teammates that he’s capable of playing,” Josh Wolff said. Athletics. “You see what the kid puts in in terms of work, what it means to be confident, what it means to have positional discipline and understand the principles of the game. He did the work in training, showing that he was capable”.
“I think we balance it pretty well,” added Owen. “When we are around football, at work, I only treat it as a coach. I’ll call him Dad at home, Josh at work.”
This family dynamic is likely foreign to most of us, but it’s standard for the Wolffs. In conversations with Josh and Owen, the two mostly sidestep questions about their father/son relationship and want to dive straight into analyzing football — their games, training sessions or other professional games from around the world. .
Wolves come from obsession honestly. In his playing days, Josh was a long-time USA international with 52 caps. Owen is joined by his older brother Tyler, 20, who is also taking a gap year with Atlanta United. Their younger brother, Gavin, is in Austin FC’s academy. Owen’s younger sister, Ella, also plays.
“I’ve been around football for a long time, around my dad,” Owen said. “He sees the game in a very different way than people do. For me, it’s about football IQ. It is a game of passing and movement, finding spaces. It doesn’t matter what position I’m playing, I feel like I do a decent job everywhere. I’ve just seen it for so long, I just see things differently.”
Owen has been comfortable as a winger and, even on rare occasions, as a defender, but father and son agree that his best position is indeed as a central midfielder.
“To me, he’s a true No. 8,” Josh said. “He is a box-to-box player, he can play between the lines. He is a good football player. Technically, decision making – not like many 17 or 18 year olds.
Owen Wolff broke fully into Austin’s first team in 2022 as a 17-year-old in a very successful team. He appeared in 24 MLS regular season games and two more in the playoffs. That set him up for another step forward this season.
“Last year I was able to get a good amount of minutes as a young player,” Owen Wolff said. “And I think it was important for me, I gained a little more confidence and comfort around the team. Coming into the preseason, I think my confidence was a lot higher than it was the first season. And I think it really, really helped me come into the season more prepared and ready for more minutes.”
Wolff appeared in both of Austin’s CCL matches this year, coming on for the first leg after the damage was done in a shock 3-0 loss to Haitian side Violette AC. He started his side’s first three MLS games, two of which were wins, then appeared in 13 of Austin’s first 14 games in all competitions before heading to the U-20 World Cup in May .
“His quality within our team is extremely good,” Josh Wolff said. “He and Dani Pereira showed they were the best right out of the gate in pre-season, they were the best at the start of the season.”
Wolff started all five of the United States’ U-20 World Cup games in front of scouts from many top leagues and clubs. Already reported to be a target for Dutch club PSV, Wolff hopes to one day be at that next level.
“Yeah, eventually I’ll be going abroad to Europe and trying to compete at the highest level,” Owen said when asked about his future goals as a player. “But now I’m focused on Austin and I’m here. I will stay focused here, improving as a player and a better person to eventually move to Europe when the time comes.”
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(Photo: Bill Barrett/ISI Photos/Getty Images)
