Hungarian international Martin Ádám garnered a lot of attention during his team’s run at Euro 2024, and simply by making an appearance in the first group game against Switzerland. His unusual look, with his big, ginger beard, broad shoulders, and puffy face, immediately made him an international fan favourite and a meme phenomenon.
Hungary ended up not advancing from the group, finishing behind Germany and Switzerland, but ahead of Scotland.
Ádám’s career was not at its high point when he came into his newfound fame. While he managed to win the South Korean championship back-to-back with his team Ulsand HD, he was also struggling to get enough playtime coming into the Euros. He only played 10 out of the 20 league games for his Korean club, usually as a substitute—and he still managed to score three goals.
As we reported earlier, Ádám did not travel back to South Korea after the Euros, despite the league restarting shortly after. What was rumoured to be the reason behind his extended stay came to be true:
Martin Ádám terminated his contract with Ulsan HD in July.
Only a couple of weeks later, the international football hero found his new team as well. As his agent, Gábor Papp told the Hungarian sports daily Nemzeti Sport, there was plenty of interest in his client. They were seriously considering singing with a team from the Brazilian first division, taking him to a third continent to play professionally in his career, but those negotiations eventually fell through. Thus, the Hungarian international decided to
join Asteras Tripolis FC, a team from the Greek top division Super League Greece.
Last season, the club came in seventh place in the 14-team league. That means that they failed to make it into the championship play-off with the top six teams, but ended up topping the relegation play-offs with the bottom eight teams.
Ádám is not the first Hungarian player to play for Asteras. It was the last club goalkeeper Márton Fülöp played for, before being diagnosed with cancer in 2013. Sadly, he passed away in 2015 at the age of 32.
Asteras Triplolis’ website quotes their newly signed striker, Martin Ádám to say:
‘I am very happy to be preparing for the next chapter in my career. I am ready to serve my new team with humility and a lot of work. I am thankful for the confidence in me and the warm welcome. Now it’s up to me to return the favours and achieve our goals together. It is very important for me that I am joining Asteras after a European Championship with Hungary that gave me so many incredible experiences.’
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