Brenden Aaronson joins Union Berlin on loan from Leeds United

Medford’s Brenden Aaronson joined Union Berlin of Germany’s Bundesliga on a season-long loan on Sunday, ensuring he’ll keep playing top-level soccer after Leeds United’s relegation from the English Premier League in May.

Not only that, Aaronson will be able to play at the highest level of all in world club soccer, the UEFA Champions League, instead of England’s second-tier championship.

In the coming season, Union Berlin will be in the Champions League for the first time in its history. Its pressing style will suit Aaronson’s game, he’ll get to enjoy life in a big city, and he’ll see a familiar face in occasional U.S. national team striker Jordan Pefok.

“Union’s path and the success of the last few years did not go unnoticed in either the USA, Austria, or England,” Aaronson said in a statement. “Somehow, you always heard something about them. A year ago, I wouldn’t have believed that I would be here and able to play in the Champions League with Union.”

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Aaronson, 22, moved to Leeds last summer for $30 million from Austria’s Red Bull Salzburg, the club that signed him from the Philadelphia Union in late 2020. It was the second-highest transfer fee paid for an American in soccer history, trailing only the $70 million that Hershey’s Christian Pulisic commanded when England’s Chelsea bought him from Germany’s Borussia Dortmund in 2018.

The move to Leeds came just a year and a half after Salzburg paid an initial $6 million to the Union to bring Aaronson to Europe. The deal also gave Union a piece of a future sale, and further money based on performance incentives. They all hit, meaning Philadelphia banked around $14 million from Aaronson’s success.

The Union won’t get any money from this latest move, because it was a loan. And they won’t get big pieces of future sales, but they will get small sums thanks to a FIFA rule that compensates the team that developed a player in his youth days.

(Though loans don’t exist in traditional American sports, they’re a common practice in the soccer world. They allow teams to temporarily cut payroll and roster sizes in a sport where most leagues don’t have strict salary caps, but have other forms of spending limits.)

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“Brenden’s commitment has made us very happy,” Union Berlin’s managing director Oliver Ruhnert said. “He is a type of player we don’t have who will be good for our attacking game. Despite his young age, he already has a lot of international experience and will complement our squad at a high level.”

It will be the second time Aaronson plays for a Champions League club. He did so with Salzburg in the 2021-22 season, scoring two goals in a qualifying series win over Denmark’s Brøndby — a team that included future Union striker Mikael Uhre.

Salzburg then advanced from the group stage for the first time in its history. While it lost to German superpower Bayern Munich in the round of 16, Aaronson had an assist in both games of the matchup.

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Aaronson played 40 games for Leeds this past season, plus four games for the United States at the men’s World Cup in the middle of the campaign. He started brightly, scoring an epic goal in August that sparked Leeds’ first win over rival Chelsea in 20 years. But that was his only goal of the season, and he totaled just three assists.

In February, Aaronson’s campaign turned even worse when he was hospitalized for appendicitis. He hasn’t said if that affected the rest of his season, mentally or physically. But in a news conference while with the U.S. national team last month, he dropped some clear hints that the grueling season had left him exhausted.

Alas, any form of a player’s health doesn’t matter in the Premier League, the most ruthless soccer league in the world. If you don’t win enough, you get relegated, and fans and media turn on you with as much ferocity as WIP has after an Eagles loss to the Giants. That promptly happened, and for better or worse the locals likely won’t lament Aaronson’s absence.

At least, not for now. If he shines in the Champions League in Berlin, will there be any remorse back in Leeds?

» READ MORE: Brenden Aaronson admits how much of a toll the long season took on him

“I’m looking forward to the year ahead with joy and confidence,” Aaronson said, “and want to help us have another successful season.”

That first clause said­ plenty in just a few words.

Playing in Germany means he’ll be just a few hours by train from his brother Paxten, who’s about to start his second season with Eintracht Frankfurt. Union Berlin hosts Eintracht on the weekend of Nov. 4, and visits Frankfurt on the weekend of March 30.

The new Bundesliga campaign starts on the weekend of Aug. 19. All of its games are streamed live on ESPN+. The Champions League group stage starts Sept. 13, with the group stage draw set for Aug. 31. All of its games are streamed live on Paramount+, with a gameday whiparound show on CBS Sports Network and some knockout-round games on big CBS.