Josh Maja - from 'unfair' portrayal in Sunderland 'Til I Die to Fulham's Spark

[WiseMind]

***article originally appearing in The Athletic***



In the middle of January, Fulham academy director Huw Jennings got a phone call.

"How would we feel..." the voice on the other end of the line said, "...if the first team were interested in bringing back Josh Maja?"

Maja had been a youth player in the Fulham academy. He joined from Crystal Palace at the age of 11, after Fulham agreed training compensation, and then put on the club's Elite Professional Performance Plan — a commitment to the player's education and associated costs for five years.

He left after just three seasons, even though Fulham did not want to lose him. The young striker's brilliance in the penalty area was catching the eye. "He was one of the best youth finishers I can recall," reflects Jennings. 

But Maja, supported by his family, wanted to go. It was his decision, one influenced by the family's move from nearby Pimlico to Muswell Hill in north London, which made his commute to training more difficult. As a result, though, he spent more than a year outside the academy system.

It was the Kinetic Foundation who ensured Maja kept up his football. Their support led to a trial with Manchester City, and after scoring as a triallist against Sunderland, it was the north east club who signed him.

Of all people, it would then be storied Fulham duo Chris Coleman and his assistant Kit Symons who would hand Maja his first-team league debut at the Stadium of Light. He came on as a second-half substitute in December 2017, and scored a priceless winning goal five minutes later. Against... Fulham.

Fast forward three years, through a rollercoaster spell on Wearside where — as two of its protagonists tell The Athletic — he was unfairly defined by his depiction in the Netflix documentary series Sunderland 'Til I Die, and then another steep learning curve in France's top flight with Bordeaux, and suddenly Maja was in line for a return to Fulham.

There was no doubt for Jennings.

"Why not?" came the response.

Maja was tasked with trying to help the club pull off another Great Escape from looming Premier League relegation. It has started well.

For Maja, the bridge between Fulham and a return to the professional academy system was the Kinetic Foundation.

The charity organisation was founded by Harry Hudson and James Fotheringham in Croydon following the 2011 riots there and in other areas of London. Their remit is to reduce youth unemployment, using football as the hook to engage disadvantaged or disengaged young people between the ages of 13 and 19. They provide community sessions as well as part-time and full-time programmes, combining football with education and training.

When it comes to football, they have had plenty of success. So far, 46 players have progressed from their academy to professional contracts, including Reading's Omar Richards and Joe Aribo of Scottish champions-elect Rangers.

But the best player they have seen? Maja.

Josh Maja Sunderland debut Fulham
Maja scores on his Sunderland debut, against former club Fulham, in December 2017 (Photo: Ian Horrocks/Sunderland AFC via Getty Images)
"We were doing a session on a Monday night and he was training with our under-18s," says head coach Hudson. "It was a nine-a-side pitch on 3G in Croydon. It is always super-tight and really competitive. I remember Josh was put in. He was 16. He dinked the goalkeeper twice in about three minutes from what must have been at least 25 yards out. The goalie was 6ft 4in and our FA Youth Cup goalie — a really good level. I still remember to this day how the whole place erupted. It was amazing."

Maja joined the part-time programme at Kinetic after a recommendation by Joe Shields, a childhood friend of Hudson's and now head of academy recruitment at Manchester City. He would travel to Croydon with his younger brother Emmanuel — who later joined the full-time programme — twice a week, on a Monday and Thursday. Sometimes, school commitments prevented him from making the second session. In the holidays, sessions would increase to three or four times a week and last a whole day. He was quickly playing for Kinetic Under-18s.

"Josh always scored goals, it was phenomenal," says Hudson.

"He struggled a bit, physically. He did a lot of work on that and it just all clicked for him at around his under-16 year. He was a joy to watch. I've been coaching for 15 years, and I like to think that we added some aspects to Josh's game. But the level he got to... I would have paid to watch him strike a football and train. He was that good. I've worked with some pretty high-profile players that have come through our programme. I've worked with Jadon Sancho. Josh's talent is the best I've worked with."

There was more to Maja's game than the finishing. Hudson highlights that they worked on improving his left foot during his time at Kinetic, as well as helping him improve his link-up play.

"If anything dropped in the box, Josh would just come alive," adds Hudson. "When we did finishing exercises, he gave no indication to the goalkeeper about where he's going to put the ball. Top left, bottom right, down the middle... he can put the ball anywhere and there's so much disguise on his finishing.

"He's not blisteringly quick, but he's athletic and can get the wrong side of defenders. His ability to finish is something that I don't believe you can teach.

"He is a genuinely lovely boy. He doesn't need to help us, but last summer, he came down to Lanfranc Academy in Croydon to visit the programme on one of his days off. He was only back in the UK for three or four days. He spoke to the boys about his experiences and they just looked at him in awe, their mouths wide open. I'm very grateful for that."

It is the summer of 2018, and Sunderland are reeling.

They have suffered back-to-back relegations to plummet into League One and are struggling under the weight of their previous Premier League expenses. According to the new ownership, led by Stewart Donald and Charlie Methven, they are £200 million in debt and losing £35 million per year. Only eight players turn up for the first day of pre-season. The rest have been released, sold or are in contractual dispute.

To add to it all, their struggles are all being played out in front of the cameras. Netflix's Sunderland 'Til I Die series has returned for a second season and continues to capture the emotional turmoil. Like any television series, it constructs a narrative to progress the story. There are the good guys, like the affable Luke O'Nien, who debuts in season two. And then there are those depicted as the bad guys, such as Maja and his advisers.

During the first half of the season, Maja is Sunderland's great hope. He was one of the eight who turned up for pre-season training to work with new manager Jack Ross, and travelled with the 16 or so other players to Portugal for the team's pre-season training camp.

"Very quickly I believed he was a player who would play for us and do well," Ross, now manager of Hibernian in the Scottish Premiership, tells The Athletic.

"He was probably the best finisher that I have worked with. I am loath to say it was natural because he worked really hard at it, but his ability to finish was really impressive. And I liked him as a young man.

"He was a beneficiary of the circumstances and then us being brave enough to give him the opportunity. After that, it was up to him, and he really flourished."

Maja helped Sunderland get off to the best possible start. He scored in each of his first four league games, and hit nine goals from his first 12 league matches. People higher on the football ladder sat up and took notice. As detailed in the documentary, Tottenham were among several clubs to watch him multiple times.

The problem for Sunderland was that he had just a year left on his contract. Maja had gone from youth player to hot prospect in rapid time, but he was not tied down long term. By the January, he would be able to speak to other clubs.

Jack Ross Sunderland
Ross says he still keeps in touch with Maja and that he was a joy to work with at Sunderland (Photo: Ian Horrocks/Sunderland AFC via Getty Images)
In the Netflix show, Maja's contract dispute takes centre stage. Sunderland are seen to make more than one offer of a new deal, the last one described as "cracking" by Donald. They are not taken up by Maja or his agent. Late in the January window, Maja is sold to Bordeaux for £1.5 million. From early-season hero to contract rebel, the narrative was clear. After the series was aired, Maja faced a strong backlash from supporters.

"It certainly wasn't Josh's fault," says Methven, a former Sunderland director and one of the stars of the documentary series. He has agreed to speak to The Athletic about the situation because of how fond he was of Maja.

"If anything it was our fault, and a lack of communication between the football director and Jack (Ross). We should have made sure he was tied down to a longer contract before they started him as their first-choice striker."

His talent was not a surprise. Methven says he was told by departing chief executive Martin Bain after their 2018 takeover that previous manager Sam Allardyce, who departed the Stadium of Light two years earlier having overseen a successful battle against Premier League relegation, left a note about the young players coming through at the club. Maja, it is said, had an asterisk next to his name because Allardyce felt he had a big future.

Methven regrets that with so much to contend with in the aftermath of a takeover and relegation, Maja's contract was not priority No 1. Maja's departure had a huge impact on Sunderland's 2018-19 season, and naturally, his decision was presented as the turning point. Having been in the automatic promotion frame throughout, they ended up finishing fifth after winning one of their last seven games and then lost the play-off final.

"If you examine the periods with Josh and without Josh, it gives a very clear indicator as to how important he was," says Ross. "If he had continued in the same vein, he would have been on target to score 25, 30 goals.

"I don't want to dramatise it and say it was the reason why we didn't get promoted, but I think losing him in January did have an impact."

Methven concurs. "It was the seminal moment of our ownership of Sunderland."

The representation of Maja as uncaring about Sunderland, with a similar reflection made of his agent who is talked about as cashing in on a potential exit, does not tell the full story.

"It was unfair," says Methven of the documentary. "It was dramatised, it amped up the awkward moments. I don't think it fully reflected the genuinely difficult position that a young man found himself in. It is very, very hard to deal with aggressive questioning from fans in public spaces. If you're 19, what is he going to say? 'Yeah, sorry. No, my agent is talking to other clubs, I'll be gone soon'. It's very difficult.

"I think Josh would have been happy to stay. He never agitated for a move. But there's a good reason why people have agents. His agent was very experienced and successful, he took the view that his future would be best served progressing at a higher level. What's happened in the intervening two years has probably borne that out. The fact that he's now starting up front for a Premier League club would hardly suggest that his career has been badly managed."

There was a lot that was not included in the series. Maja was extremely well liked, and considered to be a positive influence.

"No one would have a bad word to say about Josh," says Methven. "This guy trained every single afternoon. Clearly the culture at Sunderland had been that no one trained in the afternoon.

"Josh had come up through the academy and didn't have that attitude. Luke O'Nien signed from Wycombe and didn't have that attitude. They used to go out together in the afternoon and just train, doing drills, head tennis, all sorts of technical stuff together. I remember just thinking at the time, 'Crikey, these are two boys who are going to make the absolute best of themselves'. They were such cheerful, upbeat people to have around, it lifted everyone's spirits during what was a very difficult time with a lot of strife and a lot of redundancies.

"There were a lot of players who were really acting up and being very, very difficult, and then you have these two young guys, O'Nien and Maja, who were fresh faced and full of possibilities of the future.

"Josh was a force for good, really. Everyone was super fond of him."

Ross says he reached out to Maja after the series hit the world's screens, because of how the young striker was represented in it: "Having worked with him day in day out, one of the things I would stress is that he was incredibly courteous and polite. He was popular at the training ground, never mind just with the players.

"Before he left to go to Bordeaux, he returned to pick up some things. He left some small gifts for myself, the coaching staff and other staff around the training ground. They had small handwritten notes from Josh — a little personal message in it. That was probably the part that people don't see. The fact he is a young man, at 20, he took the time to do that. He made the effort. That's him in a nutshell.

"He was a really, really nice young man. I still keep in touch with him."

Jumping from England's third division to the top league in France was not going to be an easy task. It was mid-season, the style of football and standard of competition was different, and above all, so was the language.

Bordeaux were not the most stable proposition either.

Maja's new coach Ricardo Gomes described his signing as a "gamble". At boardroom level, a partnership between American investor Joseph DaGrosa and King Street Capital proved an uneasy union and that was exacerbated by underwhelming results on the field.

A little more than a month into Maja's time in French wine country, Gomes was dismissed. In his place came Paulo Sousa, Bordeaux's third coach of that 2018-19 season, and the man who would be in charge for the majority of Maja's two years there. In December 2019, club ultras invaded the pitch and delayed a home match against Nimes by 25 minutes in protest against the ownership situation. Maja scored a hat-trick that day in a 6-0 win.

Josh Maja Sunderland
Maja moved to Bordeaux for £1.5 million in January 2019 (Photo: Nicolas Tucat/AFP via Getty Images)
He did not set the world alight, scoring 11 goals in 49 appearances, but his strike rate of a goal every 120 minutes during the COVID-19 curtailed 2019-20 season — the closest to a full campaign he had in France — underlined his time there did not see his game regress.

In fact, it was quite the opposite. Sousa's assistant at Bordeaux, and now with Poland's national team, was Manuel Cordeiro.

"We understood it was hard for a boy to come to France without speaking a word of French," Cordeiro tells The Athletic. "We saw a kid that had his head down often. He was missing a little bit of the joy of playing football."

Cordeiro was one member of Sousa's staff who spoke fluent English. That simple change was key to helping Maja to settle, in addition to the French lessons he was taking. Off the field, this entailed ensuring he had someone available to speak to, even for small things like getting lunch or dinner, as well as encouraging him to take walks to get to know the city and bring family over in those pre-pandemic days.

On the pitch, the Bordeaux coaching staff wanted to add more layers to Maja's game. "Josh is a very, very good striker inside the box," Cordeiro adds. "His mentality there is amazing. But with a team like Bordeaux, sometimes you have to defend in a lower block, and the striker is key as a target man to recover the ball. He needed to understand that it was important to work as hard to retain the ball as it was to score."

Cordeiro says Maja was encouraged to participate more in build-up play and increase the number of pressing sprints he made per game. In training sessions, he would be tasked with acting as a target man. It was slow progress for Maja, who still scored goals when he played, but was mainly used as an impact substitute. His improvement though was encouraging, and Cordeiro highlights that he upped the number of pressing sprints he made per half to as many as 10. By the early end of last season, with the squad evolving into one more suited to its Portuguese coaching staff, Maja's all-round work was enough for him to be seen as a central part of Sousa's plans — before the coach left by mutual consent in August shortly before the new campaign kicked off.

"His game before Bordeaux, it was a much more individual game — only in the box he needed to make the difference," says Cordeiro. "In our way of seeing football, he also needed to make the difference in his interaction with his team-mates.

"At the beginning of our second season, we knew that Josh was going to be a key player. As a staff, we talked about how this was going to be his year in the regular starting XI and really explode. We thought he would easily achieve around 20 goals per season in the French league.

"His key strong point is his finishing but he needed to win more and more duels and keep possession. He improved there. He improved his understanding of the game with his team-mates."

Off the field, things improved too. "With time, you could see that he was enjoying it more," adds Cordeiro. "He's a very smiley person. He's an intelligent kid."

Under Jean-Louis Gasset, Sousa's successor, Maja found starting opportunities limited, with Hwang Ui-jo favoured to lead Gasset's 4-2-3-1. He struggled in a team who create few chances.

So when Fulham came up as an option last month, it was a move that appealed.

It was a return to a place he knew well, ensuring there would be no protracted settling in period.

There are plenty of familiar faces still on the books too, like defender Jerome Opoku, now on loan at Plymouth Argyle in League One, and Marlon Fossey who, while a full-back by trade these days, played up front with Maja at academy level.

Ademola Lookman is another Maja has crossed paths with before, and the young core in the squad should mean he continues to adapt seamlessly. There is a growing Nigerian contingent at Fulham, with Ola Aina an international team-mate and Lookman and Tosin Adarabioyo on the Nigeria national team's radar. Coach Gernot Rohr will be watching Fulham matches closely.

"I'm very happy for Josh, it was great to see him score two goals in his first game (against Everton)," Rohr told The Athletic. "In Bordeaux, he played well and I invited him to the national side. He played some minutes and was good. We are watching all the games, also for Aina, Lookman... it's a really good team, they miss a bit of realism sometimes. Maja can help to bring it, he's a goalscorer. We have a lot of strikers in Nigeria, so it's not easy to be a player to be invited.

"He has strong potential. And a very good mentality. With confidence coming back he will succeed."

Stylistically, Ross and Cordeiro believe Fulham are a good fit who will play to Maja's strengths. Head coach Scott Parker has been keen to try to lessen the amount of pressure placed on his young shoulders. But in the continued absence of Aleksandar Mitrovic after testing positive for COVID-19, the 22-year-old has found the spotlight thrust upon him. Thrown in at the deep end, so far he has shown he can swim.


Longer term, Fulham have an option to buy as part of his loan deal, understood to be worth around £9 million.

If Maja can continue his strong start to life back at Craven Cottage and inspire a survival charge, that will be a bargain.

(Top photo: Michael Regan/Getty Images)

[RaySmith]

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[FulhamStu]

Wonder if he would play in the championship ?   This will be the big question of the worse was to happen and another good reason for Scott and the team to continue our progression.   If we can keep the Nucleus of this team together, and if the worse was to happen, next season could be a lot of fun !   We could. Certainly offer contracts that focus on giving the club one season with sensible sell on prices should we fail.  I guess wages will be a major issue and players like Areola will be on far too much money.  Maja and Lookman could be doable.  Andersen would be worth pushing the boat out for but Aina and Lemina probably not necessary.  Frank should bring in big money if sold and help finance things.

[Southcoastffc]

Very interesting, thanks for posting it.

[Statto]

Sorry but you've got to laugh at the irony of him leaving Fulham because Motspur Park was too far to travel from his new home in Muswell Hill... then signing for Sunderland 
:005:

[filham]

Yes a good read but another Maja brace against Palace will make better reading.