Off Track ..... Good while it lasted for Adu

United States prodigy Freddy Adu, a player forced to live with the huge expectations created for him in his early teens, sparkled for two soccer games at the Olympics but left before he could make a real impact

Adu, who is still only 19 but seems to have been around for years, picked up yellow cards in his first two games and had to watch helplessly as his teammates lost 2-1 to Nigeria on Wednesday and were eliminated.

It was an exasperating experience for Adu, who against Japan and Netherlands had been in the sort of form which justified the enormous hype created around him.