The Indianapolis International Airport is not a hub of activity on this Monday afternoon. The rare final call for boarding echoes throughout the terminal, causing no interest from the handful of patrons tucking into buttery pretzels.

It is plausible that the arrival of a professional soccer club would cause a few heads to turn.

But that is not the case. Toronto FC II walk through the terminal and the food court undetected. They have no recognizable star power. Only goalkeeper Caleb Patterson-Sewell’s scruffy, lengthy beard sticks out from the pack. But otherwise, players fit anonymously into long lineups at Chick-Fil-A to drop some of their $60 per diem for the two-day road trip. The food might not be fit for professional athletes, but like so much of life in the United Soccer League, the decision to eat it is born out of necessity.

It is almost 4:30 p.m., but the team is still two hours away from Louisville, Kentucky, their final destination. The next day they will face Louisville City FC, the defending USL Cup champions.

It is a rescheduled game that has only added to the cramped travel schedules that are commonplace in the second tier of North American soccer.

By 7 p.m., the team meal is finally served at their hotel in Louisville. After training at 10:30 in the morning in Toronto and the long trip here, most of the players sit nearby, quietly picking at their food.

Silence, usually born out of frustration, has become commonplace for TFC II. On this late August day, they sit dead last in the Eastern Conference with a 2-18-3 record.

In June, TFC II were reminded of just how green the pastures beyond USL can be: head coach Laurent Guyot left the club abruptly to join Cercle Brugge in Belgium’s top division.

Left scrambling, the organization appointed then director of high-performance Michael Rabasca to replace Guyot. Rabasca had never coached beyond the academy level.

It has become difficult for the team to unify under these circumstances. This season has brought a harsh realization for the team’s most talented players: The likelihood of playing in MLS, or any other professional opportunity higher up the ladder, is beginning to seem unattainable.

The USL is struggling for an identity. There are 33 teams scattered throughout the United States and Canada. Some look to be ready to contend with MLS sides, such as FC Cincinnati, who consistently draw strong attendance numbers and in 2019 will move into MLS. Other teams, such as Toronto FC II, cannot draw more than a few hundred people to home matches.

And with no promotion and relegation system, the gap between USL and MLS widens and USL players often languish in anonymity.

Meanwhile, MLS is growing at a rapid rate: Five teams were added between 2015 and 2018, and three more will join the league between now and the start of the 2020 season.

MLS teams’ continued interest in bringing in foreign players to make themselves more competitive will further reduce the opportunities for young, North American soccer players.

For one week, The Athletic was granted access into the life of a USL player, spending time on the bus, the training pitch, in the dressing rooms, hotels and apartments to tell the stories of the people that make up Toronto FC II and the USL.

The team’s small, balding equipment manager, Frank Russo, pulls the team’s equipment bags off the baggage carousel without saying a word.

“OK boys, grab your bags,” says goalkeeper coach Phil Boerger.

No one on the team lifts their heads up from their phones.

“Boys,” Boerger says louder, “grab the bags.”

Players saunter to their luggage and roll them through two parking lots. When the team arrives, they almost walk right past the bus: it is half the size of a standard-sized bus for a travelling team.

Many of the younger players express surprise when they board.

“Get in here, boys,” says Patterson-Sewell. “This is as close as we’ve been all season.”

Because of the lack of space underneath the bus, Russo has been forced to load many of the team’s equipment bags in the aisle. Any trip to the toilet in the back turns into an obstacle course.

Fifteen minutes into the trip, Patterson-Sewell stumbles through bags to get to the front of the bus. He grabs a microphone and hits it with force to wake up some of the players already dozing off.

“OK, $5 if you’re in,” Patterson-Sewell says.

If they want in on the game of roulette, they’re going to have to fork over a chunk of their $60 per diem.

Athletic therapist Fabian Casal and midfielder Tsubasa Endoh collect a $5 bill from each team member with small pieces of paper with names on them for the draw.

At the same time, Patterson-Sewell begins warming up his crowd with some fun facts about their destination.

To begin, 90 percent of disco balls made in the United States were made in Louisville.

“If only we could stay over and experience that, Jordan,” Patterson-Sewell says with a deadpan stare in Jordan Custoreri’s direction. Custoreri is the team’s manager of operations and win or lose in Louisville, he has arranged for the team to return to Indianapolis to stay at an airport hotel.

Patterson-Sewell continues: There is a replica of Babe Ruth’s bat downtown, tourism is the city’s third-largest source of revenue, and Louisville has the largest pyrotechnic show ever recorded. The facts don’t get much in the way of a response.

Every name and cash entry is collected. One by one, player’s names are pulled out of a hat. The first player drawn will have an opportunity to get his money back, or go back into the draw to test his luck. The last name drawn receives the entire pot: a whopping $90.

Patterson-Sewell got the idea after travelling with the first team in training camp, when the buy-in for each MLS player was bigger than the entire pot here.

This time around, three of the team’s young players refuse to part with the $5. Patterson-Sewell shakes his head. Slowly, each teammate’s chances at fast cash disappear.

Finally, the last piece of paper is pulled by Endoh. His own name is written down.

The calls of collusion come swift and hard. Protected near the front of the bus, Patterson-Sewell concludes the team’s lone bonding activity for the day.

“Any complaints?” Patterson-Sewell asks. “You’ll find us at the bar this evening, thanks.”

The journeyman

Caleb Patterson-Sewell’s Wikipedia page requires a map to fully comprehend.

Born in Tennessee, he began his soccer career in Toowoomba, a small town west of Brisbane, Australia after moving there with his parents. He played on Belgian side Anderlecht’s reserve team, before hopping to the Sheffield Wednesday and Liverpool academy teams.

Moves to Cleveland, New York Red Bulls, Carolina and Miami followed, before transferring to Portuguese second division side Atletico Clube. He suited up for three different Primeira Liga sides over the next four years but played just three league matches. There were subsequent stops at NASL teams in Oklahoma City and Jacksonville as well as another stint in the Portuguese second division before Toronto FC acquired him ahead of the 2018 season.

His exhausting career as a journeyman is one many young USL players covet. Still, he believes the New York Red Bulls made it a “pain in the ass” for TFC to acquire him. Patterson-Sewell was last with Red Bulls in 2011. Frustrated by the lack of opportunities and the club asking him to stay with them while they made a decision on his future, Patterson-Sewell drew a line in the sand. He had other offers to be a starting goalkeeper.

“I’m happy to walk away,” he remembers telling the team. “Get me a flight out today.”

In February 2018, Red Bulls still owned his MLS rights. He had well-paying contracts with certain teams in Portugal that didn’t offer the one thing he actually wanted: playing time. So when TFC came calling for the 31-year old, he made one request: get him games every week, regardless of where those games might be.

“A goalkeeper that doesn’t get games will be a goalkeeper that struggles in the future,” Patterson-Sewell said.

If that means playing for less money than in the past, he won’t fuss. He has a two-year-old son to provide for.

“How can you convince people to play for $60 or $70,000?” he asks of the MLS senior minimum league salary for international players coming from abroad to MLS. “For me, I don’t care. I’ll play.”

Playing in the USL has led to the kind of financial hardships Patterson-Sewell tried to avoid by signing for clubs in Portugal. There’s no USL player’s union, which means players have no minimum wage.

“Clubs take advantage of that because they know there’s a market of guys that can’t make MLS, but still want to play,” he said. “There’s a lot of things that guys are willing to do to gain a foothold on the professional soccer ladder.”

And for Patterson-Sewell that means not getting a lot of eyeballs from outside the league.

Despite having more professional experience than any other player on the team, Patterson-Sewell can’t afford to spring for team dinners. But he can act as the father figure to a team that so desperately needs it.

“Camaraderie, in my opinion, is the difference between winning and losing,” Patterson-Sewell said.

So leading roulette games on the bus is par for the course of Patterson-Sewell’s life as a USL veteran and captain. He is one of the last in the buffet line during the team dinner, and takes his seat with a group of young players. He tries to make himself available to struggling teammates who may be in need of advice.

This season Patterson-Sewell also finds himself doling out the same advice to acquaintances looking for one last chance in the USL: “Know what you’re getting into.”

“Players think ‘I’m going to go and play, live the American life.’ Then they get selective with where they’re living. Some players automatically think the States is a money pit and you can come over, and it’ll be a piece of piss.

“That’s not the case. It’s a very rough league.”

Patterson-Sewell has left the door open to another five years of playing. His time in the spotlight has long passed and his only option now is to be a guiding voice to those next on the ladder.

“It is so hard to be a back-up for a long period of time and not getting games,” Patterson-Sewell said. “I couldn’t think of anything worse than being a back-up, or a third string goalkeeper, on an MLS team with no USL team. Because where do they go?”

The team’s mandatory daytime yoga session begins around 11:00 a.m. in the hotel meal room. One by one, players ask athletic therapist Andy Choi the same question: “Where are the yoga mats?”

Choi puts on a brave face. Instead of comfortable foam mats, they’ll be rolling out on white towels from the hotel.

The pregame yoga sessions are a joint directive from Rabasca and Choi. The motive is both practical and theoretical: Get in some much-needed stretching before a game, but also provide an activity to promote a sense of unity.

But today, Choi can’t catch a break.

There are unenthusiastic glares across the room when it becomes obvious that Choi can’t turn down the hotel PA’s tepid adult contemporary in favour of his calming soundtrack. Frustrated, but resolute, Choi walks to the front of the room to begin coaxing his players into deep, relaxed breathing.

“Turn your phones off,” Choi asks calmly.

Choi walks the group through what he hopes will be an uneventful 20-minute session. The Downward Dog, Child’s Pose, Half-Kneeling Twist are executed as the group remains quiet.

Toward the end of the session, Choi asks players to lie on their backs and begin meditating. Sure, Choi would have preferred to have a room separated from the sounds of a trade show occurring next door and have turned the lights completely off. So much of his day-to-day planning is about adapting to the elements. The team will have to meditate to the sounds of Bruno Mars’ “It Will Rain” instead.

Each player is asked to quietly visualize their specific tasks in that evening’s game. This has been an important element of Rabasca’s mission with the team since taking over: Forcing players to review their performances from the previous matches to extract some element of critical assessment.

The quiet doesn’t last long.

Outside of the room, a thick Southern accent pipes up. A man has stepped out of the trade show.

“What don’t you understand?” the man barks into his phone. “I want out of this terrible fuckin’ deal.”

Choi’s eyes widen. His preparation may have all been for nought.

“You need to find a new job,” the man continues, his tone growing increasingly more hostile. “And quit workin’ for this shithole company.”

The room erupts with laughter. Choi’s head sinks.

It was a memorable break in the routine for the team, but one that likely wouldn’t have been tolerated in leagues above USL.

“We can only control so much,” Choi says, shaking his head.

The in-betweeners

Lars Eckenrode and Kyle Bjornethun focused on books.

The Louisville afternoon sun is blinding. The conditions force young players inside their rooms, with the shades drawn, to drain on the hotel’s wi-fi.

But outside on the hotel’s restaurant patio, defenders Lars Eckenrode and Kyle Bjornethun sit quietly, not with their heads buried in their phones, but in books.

They call it their pre-game “mental sweat.” Eckenrode is trying to better himself by reading Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness. Bjornethun prefers sci-fi, opting for the weighty tome Artemis.

With zero combined matches with the first team, the two 23-year-olds are in-betweeners on the professional soccer ladder: Players who are not young enough to hone their skills and get by on promise, and not old enough to be called upon to provide intangible veteran leadership when needed.

They carry a pervasive feeling that their ride may be over soon. So they are trying to do things their own way while they still can.

“That’s what’s hard about being an in-betweener: We have completely different mindsets to what other guys on the team have,” Eckenrode says, tugging on his glasses. “They don’t encounter the same thoughts that we encounter on a daily basis.”

Both took similar paths: Eckenrode joined the D.C. United academy at 16, while Bjornethun joined the Seattle Sounders academy. Both left their respective academies to spend four years at university: Eckenrode at the University of Michigan and Bjornethun at Seattle University. Both were drafted on the same day in the 2017 MLS SuperDraft.

And both still live like they’re on campus. The team provides modest accommodation for some players. Eckenrode lives in a shoebox three-bedroom apartment with teammates Tim Kubel and Gideon Waja. Eckenrode’s giant yellow and blue Michigan poster hangs above the fridge, the focal point of an apartment that can be conquered in about six of Eckenrode’s lengthy steps.

Eckenrode and Bjornethun are signed to one-year deals with team options and are grappling with the same thought: How much longer can they continue as professional soccer players?

“I know I can pick up engineering whenever I want,” says Bjornethun, who recently got married. He has a couple classes left to complete his degree. Both him and his wife are from the Seattle area, and Bjornethun is starting to feel the pull to return home. “I’m just riding this out as long as I can.”

Bjornethun’s lack of enthusiasm is not unfounded. In a year when TFC’s back line has been ravaged by injuries, the opportunities for call-ups have been plentiful. But the call has not come.

To consider their time in the USL as a whole, first team success, and as an extension, success in their career can feel very far away.

“With a team like TFC, that has really good players, breaking into that team means something,” Bjornethun says.

The pervasive lack of stability is a constant. One-year contracts are the norm in the USL. Both players know that at the end of the season, they could be told there is no longer a place for them in the organization. They would have to begin the same dance again, trying to prove to teams that their services are required, and also trying to prove to themselves that they have a future in the game.

“You can’t get too set in one place in life,” Bjornethun says.

Even with half a season left, he’s unsure of where his career will take him next. Bjornethun and his wife live in a team-provided apartment with another player.

The couple accepted that she would have to pay out of pocket to have all her nursing certificates, obtained in the United States, recognized in Canada. And she doesn’t grumble about sharing the small apartment. Bjornethun smiles. He’s looking forward to telling his kids about the time he played in a different country.

But he’s already beginning to turn the page on this chapter of his career. He’s come to understand that life in the USL means thinking about where you’ll play next from the moment you first arrive in your new home.

“It’s a good thing,” says Bjornethun, “we’re not stuck in one place for more than one year.”

That hope of just one upward move is what keeps players like Eckenrode plugging away in the USL.

“It offers a lot of upward mobility,” Eckenrode says of the USL.

But the soccer world can be a turbulent one for players.

“Personally, I don’t want to be stuck where I don’t see myself for a long time,” Eckenrode says.

He may end up getting his wish.

A soccer pitch within a baseball stadium at Louisville Slugger Field.

It feels like 36 degrees Celsius when Toronto FC II step off their bus in the Louisville Slugger Field parking lot. Players’ eyes widen when the humidity hits them.

Inside the baseball stadium, there’s reason to believe Louisville City FC, and by extension, USL, have hidden the fact that this is a misplaced soccer club.

At field level, however, the reality becomes clear: these soccer teams are out of place. At one corner, kicks are taken beside a giant sign immortalizing Ham Porter from ‘The Sandlot.’ Players can take just four short steps back when taking the kick before hitting the outfield wall. Corner kicks taken at the other end of the pitch are in the shadow of the foul pole. Another corner is on top of home plate.

Each goalkeeper will spend one half playing mostly on artificial turf covering the dirt infield. As Patterson-Sewell takes shots in his warm-up, he constantly looks down to the opposite end of the pitch. The turf causes balls to bump up and roll in different directions.

“It’s gonna be a lot different down there,” Boerger says to Patterson-Sewell. “Nothing wrong with a little adversity.”

Later in the game, when Patterson-Sewell does play in that end, he will purposefully walk to his left after every save to take the kick as far away from the turf as possible.

Awkward playing surfaces are a common problem for players at this level.

Endoh believes stadium environments and playing surfaces are the biggest difference between the USL and MLS. The week before, TFC II played on multi-coloured turf in an empty Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, home of the NFL’s Colts.

“In my opinion, that should never happen,” said Endoh. “All the lines and colours, it was confusing.”

And this game in Louisville, with two different surfaces on one field, promises to be just as strange.

“As the home team, maybe you get used to it,” said Endoh. “But as a visitor, it’s hard to tell.”

Against a team that is unbeaten in their last seven matches, TFC II have low expectations. Before the game, Rabasca emphasizes specific instructions to players about their own roles. In a season filled with losses, Rabasca’s hope is that strong individual performances will lead to better results.

“The challenge is that you want to coach the team but these guys are all individuals who need individual attention,” said Rabasca. “So trying to break down the individual needs of each player and getting enough time to communicate with them. And I don’t think there’s enough time. And I don’t think that’s fair.”

Across the board, the USL is a place where players strive for more: more attention from scouts, more playing time, more recognition of their abilities. No player is comfortable in a league that is not at the top of the ladder.

But Rabasca’s initial trust in his players starts to pay off.

Endoh opens the scoring against Louisville. His celebration is muted: a smile, a few high fives and a drink of water. After 25 MLS appearances and scoring two goals, the challenge the USL presents Endoh is not how to manipulate the game in his favour, but how to ensure he’s getting enough recognition for his play.

He is one of the many players who has seen the life of occasional chartered flights, five-star hotels and international exposure.

The men that TFC II were supposed to fear playing appear to have undermined how much momentum plays into the hands of the youthful, exuberant team from the north. Endoh scores twice in a 4-1 win, the most lopsided victory in TFC II history.

The recently demoted MLS player

May 7, 2016, feels like a very long time ago for Tsubasa Endoh.

Making his fifth MLS regular season appearance after being selected with the ninth overall pick in the 2016 MLS SuperDraft, Endoh notched his first MLS goal. It was the deciding goal in front of a sold-out BMO Field during the club’s home opener.

The then 22-year old appeared to have mastered the transition from college to the pros after four seasons at the University of Maryland. The Tokyo native was raised in the Japanese Football Association Academy and fit in well as an attack-minded midfielder to play behind Sebastian Giovinco and Jozy Altidore.

Just over two years later, Endoh can’t believe how much things have changed.

Endoh’s stock plummeted in his sophomore MLS season as the addition of creative midfielder Victor Vazquez rendered his spot in the first team’s midfield all but obsolete. He appeared in just four matches in TFC’s MLS Cup-winning 2017 season.

His plight was compounded by the fact that, despite having played four years in the NCAA, he is still considered as an international player and would take up a valuable spot on the first team. His option for the 2018 season was declined by the club. Because of MLS’s arcane player rules, he can’t find a place in the league.

At 25, he is approaching the prime of his career. His talent, including his ability to work through opposition back lines with speed and deft movement on the ball, is obvious. But in the soccer world, central attacking midfielders are so crucial to a team’s makeup that it’s not uncommon to break the bank on number 10s.

Even with his attacking prowess, Endoh recently struck out when trying to achieve his ultimate goal of playing UEFA Champions League football.

A three-week trial with Belgian second-division side KFCO Beerschot Wilrijk proved fruitless. He believes head coach Marc Brys didn’t appreciate his playing style.

“If the head coach doesn’t like me,” he said, “there’s no sense in me staying to try and convince anyone.”

But now, Endoh is worse off than when he started. Weeks of training finally manifested in a succession of starts for TFC II. Endoh had a taste of the good life, and wants it back.

“As a professional,” he said, “you have to think that everyone’s watching you.”

His fight to crack the KFCO Beerschot Wilrijk lineup meant he didn’t even begin playing for TFC II until August.

“Every week we have different guys,” Endoh said. “It’s tough to have chemistry on the field consistently.”

The realization that fewer people are watching him than in years past is slowly setting in for Endoh. He admits there are days he finds the instability of life in the USL difficult to put into words.

Endoh is sure of just a few things: “You don’t have to expect anyone to be helpful and you don’t get to blame anyone else.”

Deep down, he believes someone will eventually value his talents enough to give him a chance in a better league.

“This is life,” said Endoh. “You have to embrace it. You can’t get yourself down and get into a negative way.”

And staying positive means sticking to his routine: Contributing on the score sheet, but keeping his mouth shut after scoring. He may be playing at a level that eclipses his peers on his team and in USL. But he’s still playing soccer. And that will provide him with the small bouts of happiness he needs.

“That’s the most important thing as a player,” Endoh said. “You need to play, otherwise your stock will go down.”

No single players controls the music after a win, as there haven’t been enough wins to establish that kind of routine.

So this time, Travis Scott’s “Sicko Mode” is played.

Some of the team’s younger players cut loose, but the veterans have more pressing needs: their bodies require an ice bath after a game. There is a small tub, which could comfortably fit one, but today will have to fit two or three. The only problem? There’s no ice.

Players and team staff throw a few hopeless glances around the room. Custoreri grabs two empty plastic bags and takes off running through the tunnel in search of the nearest ice machine. It’s not exactly part of his job description, but that type of manual is constantly being updated in the USL.

The music quickly stops as Rabasca delivers just his third ever speech after a win. The pressure of the next game, three days away, isn’t far removed.

“The game plan, for the most part, was followed through on and executed very well,” Rabasca says. “You know (wins) are in there to be had. It’s there. That same fight and intensity we had in practice, that was on the field. This is what has to happen. The bodies have to recover. You must look towards Friday.”

Needing to end on a high note, Rabasca quickly changes his tone.

“I don’t want to diminish this,” he says. “Enjoy the night, but remember your bodies are getting ready for the next one. This is the best win I’ve seen from TFC II. Congratulations, I’m very happy.”

A round of organized applause breaks out.

After Rabasca’s speech, many players tuck into plates of burnt stuffed pasta and dry chicken. The high of the win does not last long.

Players become preoccupied with more pressing matters. After what might have been his most influential game for TFC II, midfielder Terique Mohammed still complains to teammates that he doesn’t know how to properly put his feelings toward a girl into words.

“It’s so hard, bro,” he says, throwing out his empty plate.

As TFC’s bus leaves Louisville Slugger Field, Rabasca informs his players that the following day will begin at 7:15 a.m. with a regeneration session at the hotel pool. He stops himself as soon as the words come out of his mouth, aware of how agonizing his ask is so soon after the high point of a brutal season.

“Fellas, I know that’s hard and it’s not maybe…”

He stops himself again.

“I’d just prefer to get it done and get you home.”

At this point, few players would argue with that idea.

Players take part in an early-morning regeneration session at a hotel pool.

The first players and staff get to the hotel pool at 7:08 a.m. for the regen session, led by Casal. The bus had arrived at the team hotel well after midnight.

Everyone is bleary-eyed and discombobulated. Casal has trouble pulling open the child-proof lock into the pool.

“You have to be over five-foot-five to open it,” Kubel yaps from the back.

Choi quickly sets up a timer and speaker to time out his exercises. Most players are reticent to enter the pool, until Kubel and Endoh jump in. Their voices echo up through the multiple floors of rooms overhead.

Standing on a floor overhead, Rabasca keeps an eye on who’s made it on time and who hasn’t. Eventually, he works his way down to a poolside chair and pokes his head up occasionally from his notebook. The other coaches also sit on pool chairs. Their commentary walks a fine line between encouragement and chirping.

By 7:14, all but two players are in the pool. Choi is anxiously watching his clock and counts down the seconds until 7:15 hits. Players arriving late will be fined $20, and Choi takes a certain amount of satisfaction in handing out this fine.

Mohammed enters the pool at 7:16, and Choi pumps his fist.

Choi begins asking players to go through a number of stretches: jump as if mimicking a speed skater, walk laps in the pool, shuffle side-to-side and stretch along the wall.

Around 7:22, 18-year old Jordan Faria enters the pool area. He’s met by whistles from the rest of the team.

Choi continually has to motivate players to follow through on every stretch and activity. At this hour, even the team’s veterans find it difficult to summon up the energy to keep the team on the same page.

15 minutes after the session begins, shivering players exit the pool.

The team arrives at the airport to unwelcome news: their 10:20 a.m. flight back to Toronto is the only one on the departures board without a gate. Their plane hasn’t arrived at the airport. Just over a week earlier, the first team’s return flight was also delayed. The club shelled out for hotel rooms for the entire squad so they could grab a nap, while others hung out in the airport lounge or took a tour around San Francisco.

There will be no visit to the executive lounge for TFC II. To kill the time, half the team sprawls out on the carpeted floor with a deck of cards, playing Asshole.

For a few hours, the card game keeps their mind off of just how far away from home they are. Players roll around and stretch out their legs after each hand, eager to avoid cramping.

After four hours of waiting, there is an announcement over the PA: The team’s plane has departed Toronto.

“Why even bother telling us?” Endoh says under his breath.

Back in Toronto the next morning, some players mingle around members of the first team at the training ground cafeteria.

After a brief video session to prepare for Atlanta United II, the team gathers for the start of training at 11:18 a.m. Local trains continually pass by, and children attend a camp directly adjacent to the training grounds. Rabasca is forced to shout his instructions a little louder.

The team separates for rondos, with three players in the middle. The number of successful touches maxes out at 15.

Rabasca pauses the exercise, demanding that the ball move quicker. This time, players count up with every touch. They quickly eclipse their previous high and calls grow louder as they hit 40, 50 and finally 60 successful passes in a row.

A round of applause breaks out.

“This is the most I’ve seen them smiling all year,” one team staffer says.

Set piece practice rounds out the training session. Defender Robert Boskovic focuses on charging into the box to work on half-volleys.

After the training session ends, players walk alongside the fence, which now features young, animated children hanging off it and screaming to grab players’ attention.

“Are you the TFC?” one child screams.

“Yea,” one player mutters incredulously. “I’m Giovinco.”

Most players walk by unbothered. Only Boskovic, the local product who grew up not far from the training grounds, waves and flashes a grin, fully aware that he’s only 10 years or so removed from being a child clamouring for that smile.

The local player

Robert Boskovic’s father is always highly critical of his games. Yet for most professional athletes, criticism can be maintained at a distance through phone calls and texts.

That’s not an option for Boskovic. The 20 year old still lives with his parents. His buffer zone is a set of stairs.

Boskovic is one step away from beginning the attack for players who have played in the World Cup, but still can’t escape his own father’s criticisms.

“Sometimes you wonder, what does he know? He’s never really played soccer. Sometimes it’s hard for me to take that information from him,” Boskovic said.

Still, there are benefits to living at home. His mother’s homemade Cevapi, a Serbian meat dish that’s been perfected through generations, is one. Living rent free, which allows him to keep gas in the tank of his Volkswagen Passat is another.

But the constant harping he receives from his father always reinforces where he fits in the USL community: the local player plying his trade in his own backyard.

Growing up playing club soccer in nearby Mississauga, Boskovic admits he had never even heard of TFC II. Such was the reach of the USL. When Toronto FC noticed him during a club tournament and invited him for a trial at TFC III, he became aware of the pipeline for youth players to the first team.

Initially, his lanky frame couldn’t handle the physical demands of a back line. He abandoned the organization to enroll at Toronto’s Ryerson University to study Hospitality and Tourism.

There, Boskovic continued to play, and hit the gym to bulk up. Now aware that clubs like TFC were actually trying to provide opportunities for local talent as opposed to just signing players from abroad, Boskovic’s interest was piqued.

He’d been a casual TFC fan during the club’s early, lean years, but never forged any legitimate connection to the club.

Yet Boskovic now sees how local products such as Ryan Telfer and Raheem Edwards have made the jump to MLS from the USL.

“All my friends watch TFC all the time,” Boskovic said. “I’m trying to represent that jersey, that club, really well.”

When highlights from the first team’s games pop up at a local sports bar, Boskovic fields questions from his friends. He’s close now, both literally and figuratively, to the club that they are fans of.

“You don’t want to give off bad vibes and make it seem like you’re just floating around there,” said Boskovic of how he reacts when the conversation turns to TFC. “You want to make this club move in a forward motion and not just stand in the way.”

Like many, the realities of life in USL can sometimes grate on him. The five-hour bus rides are a start. And then there are the small crowds. He admits that it can be tough for him to motivate himself in front of 100 or 200 people. Some players can relish in the anonymity. But when these sparsely attended games happen just a few kilometres from where he grew up, Boskovic can not.

“You get to play at (BMO Field), but then you look and you wonder who’s watching,” Boskovic said. “Oh, it’s my parents, they’re up top. I can see them.”

He is young, but still can’t help but wonder what his future holds in professional soccer.

“It can get hard when you don’t hear things from management.”

But the more he plays for his hometown club, the stronger the connection he feels. So he’ll try not to question where his career is headed.

Whenever he does, he looks up into the stands. The people that care about him are easy to spot.

“That definitely motivates me.”

No one on the team will have to look far to see friends and family on Friday night. Toronto’s Lamport Stadium can hold 9,600 people. That puts the stadium at 2-percent capacity when TFC II and Atlanta United II kick off just after 8:00 p.m. with an announced attendance of 196, though even that total appears generous.

Every bit of vocal direction from one player to another is not only heard well by every spectator but bounces around the stadium.

In added time in the first half, Atlanta defender Tyler Ruthven charges at Mohammed after the TFC midfielder landed a late challenge and hits him on the face.

A brawl breaks out between the two teams. Eventually, Mohammed is shown a yellow card and Ruthven is shown a red card.

At halftime, Rabasca’s frustrated message is simple: You’re just not playing well enough, and not playing anywhere near the level that the team did just days earlier. The players are equally as exasperated.

“You see what we’re capable of in Kentucky,” says Eckenrode. “When you don’t even put half the effort in that we did then, it’s extremely frustrating for the players, the coach and the fans.”

More frustration comes to start the second half on an easy Atlanta goal.

In less than an hour, TFC II have gone from the penthouse to the basement.

“I think we might have taken this game for granted, that we could maybe rest on our laurels after a strong performance against Louisville and the momentum of that performance was going to be enough to carry us through,” Eckenrode says.

The team emerges from a cramped dressing room post-game to a small table stocked with chicken wings and quesadillas. Most players can pick away at the food undisturbed. Besides the official team website, there is only one other reporter waiting to speak to the team: a man holding a large reusable grocery bag affectionately known in local soccer circles as “Rocket Robin.”

As the single light on the single video camera turns on, Kubel sneaks out on crutches after being injured in the first half. In his first season in the USL, not much has gone according to plan for Kubel.

The confused rookie

When Tim Kubel entered Toronto FC training camp after being drafted in the first round weeks earlier, he believed he could crack the first team. He’d been a starter at the University of Louisville after spending time with German sides Borussia Dortmund and Schalke’s reserve squads, having been scouted by Jurgen Klopp.

He had no idea what he was in for.

As a right back, Kubel found it impossible to constantly sprint back to catch speedy wingers on runs, and was singled out by the club for his poor fitness.

He shed 25 pounds. That weight loss brought on muscle injuries.

As a USL rookie, Kubel has asked himself repeatedly if professional soccer is the life for him. Like so many young men and women, Kubel has finished university and is unsure how to make an impact on the world around him.

While the USL forces some players to raise the level of their play to fulfill their dreams of playing in more recognized professional leagues, it also forces other players to begin questioning what those dreams are in the first place.

At Louisville, between his commitments to his team, his classes and his community service, Kubel says he “never had time to think.” But now, with his team requirements usually finished around 3 p.m., Kubels returns home to ask serious questions about his future.

“I always played soccer at the highest level because I wanted to go pro,” Kubel says. “But then I started asking myself, ‘What do I really want to do?’ I have a finance degree in marketing…”

His voice trails off, uninterested in a future crunching numbers.

To forge his own path, Kubel spent this year calling old coaches, asking for advice: What do they think he should do with the rest of his life?

All his coaches came back with the same feedback: His work with special needs students in Louisville showcased a person who had an unlikely ability to communicate. His coaches saw him as a future coach.

He went to TFC Juniors, the club’s young player development program, to see if he could shadow some of the program’s coaches for a month or so.

“With young people, you can use soccer as a means to teach values and find power in your life,” Kubel says.

Kubel was hooked. Playing in the USL may have opened his eyes to another career altogether.

“The way they treat kids, and how their eyes light up, it’s priceless,” Kubel says, his eyes also growing wide. “I found out that’s where my passion is: coaching.”

Instead of blindly accepting that the life of a professional soccer player is a blessed one, the USL has made Kubel ask more questions of himself.

“In my opinion, we spend way too little time really understanding why we’re actually doing things,” Kubel says.

No game perhaps made Kubel feel further away from the life of a professional player than on May 9. A freak, season-ending injury to goalkeeper Angelo Cavalluzzo forced Kubel between the sticks.

“I knew they knew that I was still a bit out of shape, so maybe they just thought, ‘Put the German in goal,’” Kubel says.

The only goalkeeper shirt the team had was two sizes too big for him. When the first shot came at him, instincts kicked in and he simply stuck out his hands. He blinked, and then blacked out. He doesn’t remember making the save.

He’d later hear from his mother, who able to stream the game in Germany, that she was doubling over with laughter while watching her son play goalkeeper.

Still, having a clear purpose, even for a few minutes, provided a rare boost of confidence for Kubel.

“I kept a clean sheet, don’t forget that,” says Kubel.

But Kubel is still trying to figure out exactly what he’s good enough to be.

For now, it’s not soccer. The lack of opportunities that his one year in the USL offered has forced Kubel to walk away from the game.

At the conclusion of the season, Kubel told the club he was returning home to Germany. He’s keeping his future tight to his chest.

“I have plans,” he said with a devilish smile.

You could argue the USL has claimed another victim. However to people like Kubel, and perhaps many other players like him, it might have just shown him a way out.

(All photos by Joshua Kloke/The Athletic)