Growing up Jordan Allen didn’t have many Black teammates. And, outside of his father he didn’t have coaches that looked like him either.
The son of a Jamaican father and White mother, Allen grew up in Rochester, New York. Inspired by his father, a former professional soccer player who had immigrated to the United States for the game, Allen pursued the game beginning at a young age where he quickly became a standout in more ways than one.
As aforementioned above, Allen did not grow up playing with many other Black teammates, in fact it wasn’t until he joined the U.S. Soccer residency program in Bradenton, Florida as a teenager that those he shared the pitch with began to look more and more like him.
After a brief stint in Florida, he gained the attention of Real Salt Lake, joining the RSL Academy in Arizona. For much of his life it was just his father was his sole Black role model, but suddenly that began to change. It was here that his world of soccer truly began to expand in color, learning under Black and Latino coaches and alongside players from all over the world.
“For the first time I was coached by guys from different backgrounds,” Allen said. “I had people of color in influential positions all around me.”
He was led by guys like former RSL head coach Freddy Juarez and Tyrone Marshall.
Following an impressive Freshman campaign at the University of Virginia Allen returned to RSL, this time as a Homegrown Player for the first team in Salt Lake City, Utah.
“I remember when I signed, I had a lot of questions from friends and family back home about whether or not I would be comfortable as a Black man in Utah,” Allen said. “There is this stigma about the state based on demographics, but even in my first year here those numbers were changing rapidly,”
Unfortunately for Jordan injuries derailed his professional dreams and he retired from soccer in his early 20s. But his time in soccer was not done, as he elected to pursue a career in coaching, joining his former college team as a Graduate Assistant.
And earlier this month he was announced as the Head Coach for the RSL Academy U17s, leading a group of men who last year won the MLS NEXT Cup at the U15 level.
“I’m perhaps the luckiest 26-year-old in the world,” Allen said. “For me getting my degree was crucial and at the same time I was able to continue in the game. And now I am gaining a wealth of knowledge from people of color, working under RSL Academy Director of Coaching Arnold Rijsenburg, and learning from RSL Head Coach Pablo Mastroeni and Real Monarchs Head Coach Jamison Olave.”
As a player and a coach Allen has never really viewed himself as an inspiration, or an influential person of color, he feels there are more important people for those titles, and yet he is taking up the same mantel of those who influenced him.
This year, during Black History Month, Allen is leading a team filled with athletes of all colors and ethnicities, coming a long way from his youth days when he was one of the only one.
“Black History month provides us with an opportunity to focus on all black individuals, to become more educated and celebrate the history that we already know,” Allen finished.
