Eleven defeats in a row! Brenden Aaronson's Union Berlin loan has been a disaster - and it could affect his USMNT prospects

Aaronson is no stranger to strife, of course. Last season, he endured a hugely testing campaign at Leeds United alongside U.S. men' national team colleagues Tyler Adams and Weston McKennie. After starting promisingly enough, Aaronson and Co's season veered violently off course. Three permanent managers failed to get a tune out of the squad, with the Whites eventually finishing five points adrift of safety.

McKennie and Aaronson, in particular, received plenty of flak at the end of that campaign for their underwhelming performances, with the former pictured boarding a train away from Leeds mere hours after relegation was confirmed.

Meanwhile, Aaronson was repeatedly criticised for his lack of physicality, while stats provider Who Scored gave him the dubious honour of being named their worst Premier League player of the season.

Despite his inability to adapt to the rigours of Premier League football, Aaronson had no shortage of suitors this summer. Fulham were strongly linked with a loan move, but ultimately decided against adding the midfielder to their own USMNT contingent.

In the end, Aaronson would jet off to Germany to join 2022-23 Bundesliga surprise package Union. Their remarkable story - from blood donations keeping the club afloat to automatic Champions League qualification- is well documented, and the switch represented a huge opportunity for the player.

At Union, he had the chance to test himself at the pinnacle of the European club game, while remaining insulated from the intense scrutiny that is part and parcel of playing for the continent's very biggest clubs. His excellent mobility and work-rate also seemed well suited to the Bundesliga, where the high-press and counter-attacking football remain king.

It felt like the perfect place for Aaronson to make a fresh start and get his fledgling career back on track.

But the reality has been rather different. Since joining Union, Aaronson has generally played as one of Urs Fischer's advanced central midfielders in his favoured 3-5-2.

His Bundesliga debut came against Mainz, and while Union's 4-1 win might suggest it went well for the American, he was a passenger throughout the contest. Striker Kevin Behrens - who scored a hat-trick - was the only Union starter who had fewer touches than Aaronson. He also completed just one progressive pass, barely carried the ball and failed to take a shot.

Things got worse the following week against Darmstadt, with Aaronson dismissed for two yellow cards inside 20 minutes, leading to him trudging down the tunnel with his shirt over his head. Since that early bath, Aaronson has started just three more times under Fischer, all of them losing efforts.

Even when he has got on the pitch, Aaronson has done little to redeem himself. Each of his Champions League appearances have been disappointing, starting with last-gasp heartbreak against Jude Bellingham and Real Madrid. He only appeared as a late sub in that one and could not prevent Bellingham scoring a 94th-minute winner to break Union hearts.

His side's second group game against Braga was similarly challenging. Again, Aaronson came on off the bench and was presented with a golden opportunity to grab a late winner, only to place a point-blank header wide. Moments later, Union's Portuguese opponents grabbed all three points in dramatic fashion.

The bad times continued against Napoli in one of Aaronson's rare starts. The first half was probably his best for Union, but the mask eventually slipped and the Bundesliga strugglers capped off their first trio of Champions League fixtures with another defeat.

Domestically, the story's been the same for Aaronson. Namely, occasional and ineffectual cameos paired with constant defeat. The dream he was sold in the summer is quickly turning to dust in front of his eyes.

It would be wrong to pin Union's struggles solely on Aaronson, though. However, his performances are a symptom of a wider malaise that has infested the club this season.

Ahead of their inaugural Champions League campaign, Union altered their transfer strategy somewhat, targeting high-profile players for the first time ever. Leonardo Bonucci, Kevin Volland, David Datro Fofana and Robin Gosens came in alongside Aaronson. Other than Gosens, all of these big names have underwhelmed massively.

GOAL Germany's Deputy Editor, Falko Bloeding, told us: "Aaronson fits the bill with everything that is wrong with Union. Their transfers were horrible. They are big names for a club like Union and they do not perform as expected.

"They had a clear, hard-working identity before and you should not forget that everything worked out perfectly for them over the last years. They were incredibly efficient in everything, and especially on the pitch, so now they are struggling for the first time and they can't deal with it. They must get back to what made them strong, which is hard work, and go from there to have better results again. For now, it looks like a really difficult situation."

So, with Aaronson showing little sign of improving his club form, what does this all mean for the USMNT? In his defence, his recent international performances have been fairly solid. He grabbed a goal and an assist in the September international break - with the caveat that the games were against Uzbekistan and Oman - and added energy off the bench against Germany and Ghana more recently, without making a telling contribution to either game.

Barring a significant shift in fortunes before this summer, this is likely to be his role heading into this summer's Copa America: a 'closer', introduced to chase down the opposition in the second half. Christian Pulisic and Timothy Weah are ahead of him out wide, and if Gregg Berhalter opts to use a No.10, Gio Reyna and Malik Tillman would both be above him in the pecking order.

There's even a possibility that he loses this rotational role altogether before the tournament. Wolfsburg star Kevin Paredes is edging closer and closer to becoming a regular starter in the Bundesliga and offers similar versatility and energy to Aaronson.

There's also a threat coming from inside his own family. Brother Paxten has been thrown into the Eintracht Frankfurt side in the Europa Conference League this season and has the potential to be even better than his sibling - partly thanks to the opportunity he has to learn from Brenden's strife, as detailed in an exclusive interview withGOAL back in 2022.

Aaronson will be desperate to avoid losing his spot in the national team, but if he does not find some form in Germany soon, it's a decision that could be taken out of his hands.