Interview; Adam Moffat, former Elgin City footballer now plying his trade with Houston Dynamos in the MLS

From the Third Division to the glamour of an MLS Cup final against David Beckham, Adam Moffat tells Paul Forsyth about his professional and personal transformation

EVERY now and then, Adam Moffat takes a look at where he has come from, where he is headed, and reaches the conclusion that somebody up there likes him. Four years ago, he was struggling to make an impression with Elgin City in the Third Division. Next Sunday, he will be up against David Beckham’s Los Angeles Galaxy in the final of the MLS Cup.

In 2007, an impulsive decision to try his luck in the United States transformed not just his career, but his entire life. The 25-year-old now has a base in Texas, where he plays for Houston Dynamo, and an American wife, Jennifer, with whom he spends each winter walking on the beaches of California. So happy is he with his lot that he has no plans to return to Scotland, even in the long term.

And Moffat says the whole transformation of his professional and private life has been a humbling experience.

“I was raised in a Christian family, but I wouldn’t say I became a Christian until I was over here,” he says. “I never went to church when I was younger. It wasn’t something I cared for. But when I came over here, it was like my life was getting put on a new path. The way things were falling together, I just felt that there was something else. I’m good at football and I needed a team to sign me, but I felt there was something behind that. It wasn’t just me. It’s been an amazing journey. Just to be able to play and to meet the people I’ve met... I’ve been blessed.”

It’s not unusual for athletes in America to be so frank about their faith. Moffat admits that it wouldn’t be so easy in his homeland, where religion and sport have an uncomfortable relationship.

“In football back home, you don’t hear many people talking about it, but it’s more acceptable here. Back home, it’s regarded as a weakness, which it isn’t. Here, you see American footballers, big 300-pound guys, talking about their faith. It gives them strength.”

Moffat was born in Glasgow but, for six years, the family lived in Wales, where he and his sister learned the language. When they returned north, from the age of seven, Moffat grew up in Linwood, playing much of his football for Rangers’ youth teams at Murray Park. In his teens, he won international recognition, with Charlie Mulgrew, Ross McCormack and Graham Dorrans among his peers.

His first professional contract was with Ross County, for whom he never played. Elgin gave him regular first-team experience, but there was no indication of what was to follow. By his own admission, his career seemed to be going nowhere until Richie Huxford, a coach at Elgin, helped him to line up an opportunity with Cleveland City Stars, two levels below Major League Soccer. Moffat played so well in a few months there that he was signed by Columbus Crew. Since then, he hasn’t looked back, apart from to try to maintain a degree of perspective.

In 2008, when Columbus won the MLS Cup, he was recovering from a cruciate ligament injury, but the team’s exuberant celebrations took him all the way to the White House, where he shook hands with Barack Obama. “It was funny just thinking that, a few years earlier, I had been playing in Dingwall but here I was, meeting the president. Amazing.”

Moffat is no starry-eyed kid but his brushes with celebrity have become amusingly frequent. He and Jennifer were having breakfast on a Hawaii beach last year when they met guitarist Carlos Santana. He ran into rock star Gene Simmons of Kiss a few months ago, actor Kelsey Grammer last year and, before that, tennis player Serena Williams, with whom he posed for a picture at Los Angeles airport. “I’m a bit more shy now but I thought: ‘I’m going to get my photo taken with her and send it back home. My buddies will like that’. You see a lot of famous people over here, especially if you’re going through airports a lot. It’s kind of funny.”

Moffat finds a lot of things funny.

At the start of this year, he joined Portland Timbers, coached by John Spencer, but it didn’t work out, and his spell there is mostly remembered for the day he got Thierry Henry sent off. Henry, playing for New York Red Bulls, was mischievously tapping Moffat on the back of the head, but when the tap became a slap, the Scot squared up to the former Arsenal striker and the outcome was a red card for the Frenchman. Henry’s indignant response, theatrically shaking players’ hands as he made a slow exit from the pitch, did him no favours. “It was quite funny,” says Moffat. “He was winding me up all night long. He tried to be a bit sneaky, but he never got away with it. It’s quite a good claim to fame, getting Thierry Henry red-carded.”

Moffat is a warrior of a midfielder, whose job is to win the ball and pass it on, but there are goals in him too. When Spencer traded him to Houston in July, the coach could not have anticipated how spectacularly that would return to haunt him. When the Timbers played Houston in August, Moffat scored a stunner from all of 38 yards in a 2-1 win. He produced another one from an almost identical position against LA Galaxy in the final match of the regular season. “I’ll maybe score twice a year. That’s my average. So it’s a bit of a joke that I’ve scored two goals from a combined distance of, like, 76 yards. Since I’ve come to Houston, I’ve had a few cracks, a few near misses.”

Moffat lives just outside the centre of Houston, a sprawling metropolis stifled in the summer by humid heat. Night temperatures have ruled out camping, which he enjoyed in Portland, but his new town has its attractions, not least a cultural scene that has led him to discover country music. Kenny Chesney and the Zac Brown Band are his favourites. He has taken to the American lifestyle, so much so that he doesn’t envisage giving it up. His last visit to Scotland was three years ago, to introduce Jennifer to his parents. “If an opportunity came up to play back home, whether it be Scotland or England, I’d think about it, but I see myself settling here. My wife is from California, which isn’t a bad place to settle, is it?”

For now, Moffat is happy to do a power of work for Dynamo. Part-owned by boxing legend Oscar De La Hoya, their crowds average just under 20,000, and they will move into a new stadium next year. They have won the MLS Cup twice already, thanks to Glasgow-born coach Dominic Kinnear. They made a sticky start to this season but, since Moffat’s arrival, there has been no stopping them, especially in the play-offs.

Sunday’s final will be a huge challenge. According to the US media, LA are destined to win. Not only is the final being held at the Home Depot Center, the Galaxy’s own stadium, it is being billed as Beckham’s last appearance in the States. “He’s getting on a bit now, but he’s a hard worker and he’s still a quality player,” says Moffat. “Some of the crosses he whips in are unstoppable. With all the speculation that it is to be his last game, there is a lot more interest than usual from other parts of the world, which is good because it takes the pressure off us. All the focus is on them. I’m just glad to be a part of it.”