Real Madrid spent £38.7 million on South American youngster Vinicius Junior recently.
There have been endless compilations of the player’s brilliance to explain why Madrid made the move. He is officially one of the most expensive youth players of all times.
Many predict that he is the future ‘Galaticos’ at the Bernabeu but have we not heard that story too many times? Norwegian star Martin Odegaard was celebrated as much when he moved to Madrid in 2015. He was expected to play in the Team B with Zinedine Zidane coaching and also with the senior team. The end result is that he is a winner of the 2015/16 Champions League without kicking the ball at all. He is rotting away somewhere playing on loan.
BojanKrkic was the same thing at Barcelona. He even scored ten goals in his debut season at NouCamp, many labelled him the new Lionel Messi. After many years, he is on a loan deal at Mainz 05 after time at Milan, Ajax and Stoke City.
Manchester United had theirs in Federico Macheda. The 17-year old entered the Premier League with a bang, helping the club secure the title against Liverpool. He currently plays in the Serie B in Italy after years of failure.
Arsene Wenger’s own isNicklasBendtner. He had a brilliant star at Arsenal’s academy but failed to match expectations. He has a long string of failures. At 29, he seems retired without ever playing ‘real’ football as many hoped.
The next ‘Diego Maradona’ Sonny Pike goes the same way. His legs were insured for £1 million at 14 but he failed to manage the expectations. The player, who later revealed that his father played a part in his problems as he was carried away, is a carpenter now who does not even watch football.
The youngest player to feature in the MLS at 14 year Freddy Adu is the same story. How are we sure Vinicius won’t go the same way? There are too many bad stories.