The inborn flair that comes naturally with Brazilians has often seen clubs in the past pay surprisingly large amounts of fee for teenagers who are yet to prove themselves on the big stage and Real Madrid’s case is no different.
Having signed 17-year-old Rodrygo for 45 million Euros making him the third most expensive teenager at the time, the expectations from him were surreal when he arrived at the beginning of the season in Madrid after having spent an additional year with Santos on loan.
However, the Samba boy soon impressed the Santiago Bernabeu faithful in pre-season. It didn’t take him long to win the trust of their talismanic manager Zinedine Zidane and was handed a La Liga debut in the last week of September against Osasuna.
He soon made his first European appearance against Galatasaray away from home in October and just 8 days later, scored his first goal for the Los Blancos in the league.
However, it was his performance midweek that grabbed the most headlines.
With Gareth Bale not in the squad, he was given another chance to start the match and came out with flying colours.
Two goals in the opening ten minutes were followed by an assist in the dying moments of the first half, before he capped off his hat-trick in injury time.
Not only did he become the second youngest after Raul to have scored a Champions League triplet, he was named the competition’s player of the week and announced himself to the world in remarkable fashion.
His teammates were evidently ecstatic for the prodigy amidst them, but none so much as compatriot and fellow teenager Vinicius Junior.
The two have had similar stories uptil joining the Vikings and the 19-year-old was the first to congratulate his Seleção youth teammate.
As the man of the moment entered the dressing room with the customary match ball, the two shared a fancy handshake before hugging each other, with Vinicius’ grin on full display.
Vinicius was the first to congratulate Rodrygo on his hat-trick in the dressing room. pic.twitter.com/w5YgUd9LpL
While the Brazilian duo has constantly been pitted against each other by the Spanish media, Los Blancos fans would be hoping to see the partnership between the pair thriving both on and off the pitch for years to come.
