Chelsea midfielder Enzo Fernandez has hailed River Plate teenager Franco Mastantuono as an “unimaginable participant” and tipped him to excel in European soccer.
Fernandez’s employers Chelsea and Manchester United are additionally regarded as eager admirers of the attacking midfielder. Each Premier League golf equipment have been linked with a transfer for the record-breaking 17-year-old, who is claimed to have a launch clause value €45m (£38.4m).
Very similar to Mastantuono, Fernandez got here via River’s academy. Regardless of by no means enjoying with the Argentina under-20 worldwide, Chelsea’s playmaker had nothing however reward for his compatriot.
“He is exhibiting that he has a European future. You possibly can see it,” Fernandez informed ESPN. “He is an unimaginable participant. He is doing very nicely and has proven nice expertise. For my part, he is a star. I want him one of the best and hope he can obtain all his targets. Hopefully he also can assist us within the nationwide workforce.”
Mastantuono turns 18 in August, so any potential suitors from Europe would be capable to legally signal him this summer season. But, for all of the reward lavished on the teenager, his expertise of senior soccer is desperately minimal. Mastantuono boasts lower than 1,000 minutes of top-flight soccer, scoring a single purpose in his first 90-minute sport.
River head coach Marcelo Gallardo has been extra measured in his evaluation of the workforce’s newest starlet. “Mastantuono continues to point out flashes of being a particular participant,” the supervisor conceded. “We have to perceive the expansion course of; the younger gamers must develop with the workforce. We’ll preserve backing them with out getting carried away or heaping an excessive amount of stress on them.”
Not everybody obtained the memo. River’s legendary former attacking midfielder Andres D’Alessandro has lauded Mastantuono. “I am an enormous fan of his as a result of he is left-footed; he jogs my memory of the gamers we had at River previously, the pure playmakers – the No 10s the membership has all the time produced and continues to provide as we speak,” he gushed.
