Manchester City fans are looking forward to watching Claudio Echeverri in the future – and the youngster showed his quality yesterday by scoring his first senior goal for River Plate.
City completed a deal to sign Echeverri in January, with the club paying around £12.5 million.
The club confirmed the signing, but made the decision to keep the Argentine youth international at River Plate for the time being.
He will stay where he is until January 2025 and then come to City and hopefully make a first-team impact in similar fashion to Julian Alvarez, who also remained at River after signing for City.
Yesterday, River took on Gimnasia in the Argentine Premier Division and won 3-1 – and Echeverri scored a tremendous goal…
Man City have signed a gem in Claudio Echeverri as he scores first goal for River Plate
City officials are hoping that attacking midfielder Echeverri just play as much as he can between now and next January, so that he comes to the Etihad ready to shine.
Obviously, Julian Alvarez has been a brilliant signing so far, and him staying at River for a period of time before moving to City was clearly a wise move.
It looks like Echeverri, 18,is already looking like a top prospect.
Last night, he featured for River in their game against Gimnasia, and he opened the scoring for his side in quite brilliant fashion.
He collected a square pass on the edge of the penalty area and his brilliant first touch took him away from a defender and into the area.
He then got the ball onto his right foot as if to open his body and shoot to the far corner. But he rolled the ball to his left side, beating another defender, and unleashed a fierce strike at the near post, giving the goalkeeper no chance.
It was a goal that would not look out of place from a prime Sergio Aguero, and the City legend actually acknowledged Echeverri’s finish on X as he shared the clip, leaving a sunglasses emoji.
It was Echeverri’s first senior goal, and came days after he helped his club to reach the Supercopa Argentina final.
City have found another gem
It looks as though the City scouts will be getting some more pats on the back soon.
Echeverri’s goal was top quality, but the rest of his performance against Gimnasia was also very good, as he completed 35/40 (88%) passes, two of which were ‘key’.
Hopefully, Echverri can now build on this and score a few more goals for River before he comes to the Etihad.