Everyone assumed Xabi Alonso would try to bring Florian Wirtz with him from Bayer Leverkusen to Real Madrid last summer when he became the Merengues new manager, but he rejected the German international and instead went with Juni Calafat's pick from Argentina, River Plate phenom Franco Mastantuono. And after he lost out on Julian Alvarez to Manchester City a few years ago, Florentino Perez obliged in spending an insane 60 millino euros on the unproven playmaker, not wanting to miss out on a potentially elite left footed player for years to come.
Mastantuono immediately started for Alonso to everyone's surprise, but he struggled badly in his first season at Real Madrid. By the end of the season, he was completely phased out of the lineup, and his bad attitude even caused issues with Alonso, who was the one believing in him in the first place.
An obvious candidate to go on loan without the intelligence of a No. 10 right now nor the athleticism of a right winger, everyone assumed that Jose Mourinho would not have Mastantuono in his plans this season and sanction a loan year for the Eminem look alike to improve.
Jose Mourinho might be spotting something
Instead, Rodra P of ESPN Deportes is reporting, via the Madrid Zone, that just as with promising young striker Gonzalo Garcia, Mourinho does not want to let go of Franco Mastantuono just yet this summer window. He wants to wait to evaluate him in person before making a decision, and he does not want to let him leave right now.
Perhaps Mourinho could change his mind and let Mastantuono go, but it sounds like Mourinho wants to give the Argentinian prospect a real chance to impress in games this season and not loan him out, unless if he really sees a reason to.
Mourinho cares a lot about attitude and work rate, and Mastantuono will have to improve by huge margins in both regards. But the Portuguese manager is a legend for a reason, and that reason is his ability to identify true top players and support them.
Like Juni Calafat and Xabi Alonso, Mourinho sees something in Mastantuono, and as rough as his first season was at Real Madrid, there is nobody talking about giving up on him permanently - and only talk about loan deals - because everyone can see that he has something special about him that is worth cultivating. Let's see if Mou can do better than Alonso and Alvaro Arbeloa.
Add us as a preferred source on Google