TalentSpotter: Gabriel Barbosa
Gabriel Barbosa
Club : Inter Milan (on loan at Benfica)
Position : Forward
Value : £15m
Foot : Left
Nationality : Brazil
Age : 21
About Him
Compared to: Neymar – He has lit up inter Milan games with his skills and pace just like Neymar. Brazilians are highly-rated usually because of their fancy skills and pace, so that why he’s been tipped to be the next Neymar – or at least somewhere around his level.
“Gabriel has extremely high quality and is a good finisher and provider. He knows where the goal is, but obviously as a new player he has things he needs to build on to make the most of a professional career.” from his old coach at Santos.
His Story: The Brazilian forward started his career at Santos and made his debut at only 16 years old in 2013. Ever since his debut for the club, he went on to score 24 goals in 83 games, where he scored his first professional goal at the age of 16. After a successful time at Santos, he attracted interests from European giants such as Inter Milan. He joined the Italian club in 2016, in a deal worth €29m. The forward struggled to get game time at Inter as he only made 9 appearances and just scored 1 goal.
Linked with: Liverpool and Tottenham throughout the summer but he joined Benfica on a season-long loan.
Strengths and Weaknesses: Barbosa has a great bundle of skills but his main strength is his shooting and headers whereas his weakness is crossing which is what a winger should be good at.
Playing Style: As you know Gabriel is known for his technical skill, creativity, and finishing but his main style is cutting in from the right where he uses his strength of shooting from long range.