This transfer season hasn’t gone particularly well for Barcelona with failed bids for Brazilian Paulinho and frustrated by attempts to sign Hector Bellerin from Arsenal and Marco Veratti from PSG. Now, the Catalan team has announced on twitter that they have met an agreement with the Portuguese youngster Nelson Semedo who is widely hailed as the “Next Dani Alves”.
👋 Bem-vindo!
👋 Welcome!
👋 Benvigut!
👋 ¡Bienvenido!
🔵🔴 #BeBarça pic.twitter.com/fEHCKtSAtF— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona) July 14, 2017
After Dani Alves left Barcelona, They could not sort out the situation at right back, They have brought in Alex Vidal but his season ended with the injury and they deployed Sergio Roberto at the right back who did a decent job but caught up easily on the wings because of his in experience.
Now they have addressed the problem by signing Primeira Liga’s Breakthrough Player of 2016-17, Nelson Semedo.
Here are all the things that you need to know about Nelson Semedo:
#1. Meteoric rise:
At the age of 18, he signed for S.L. Benfica from Sintrense and three years later he made full debut for four times consecutive Portuguese champions and in two months later he has been selected as Portugal’s right-back for the European Championship qualifier against Serbia.
#2. Fearless:
The literal translation of his name “sem Medo ” is ” Without fear” and his fearlessness has been a feature in his career till date. His main feature is eye catching attacking play. He is very much a modern full-back who always like to move forward.
#3. Injury concerns:
After breaking into Benfica first team in 2015 and called into Portugal Euro 2016 qualifier squad for matches against Denmark and Serbia. He suffered a knee injury while training on international duty and struggled to recover from and dropped to Benfica B team by the end of 2015-16 season.
According to his former Benfica team-mate Victor Andrade, now playing in Germany at TSV 1860 Munich, who said: “I’ve always said and I continue to say that he’s a superstar. If he hadn’t got injured he’d have been a European champion with Portugal, he would have been the first-choice right-back.”
#4. The next Dani Alves? :
The Portuguese love to attack the wing and get behind defenders and he is incredibly quick and is skilful with the ball. He started his career out as a right midfielder and then successfully adapted as a full-back. He is an excellent attacking full-back but needs to adapt to the style of Catalans to reach the level of Dani Alves.
#5. The Complete Package:
#SquawkaScout: Nélson Semedo. ⚡️
70 tackles won 💪
49 take-ons 🔥
33 chances created 🎯New club: Barcelona. 🔵🔴 pic.twitter.com/MdOBHTM7WH
— Squawka Football (@Squawka) July 14, 2017
He has improved massively in his last season and hasn’t missed a single game in the first half of the season. he was one of Benfica’s most reliable performers last season in which they have won both the Primeira Liga and the Taca de Portugal.No other defender attempted (105) or completed (49) more dribbles in the 2016-17 Primeira Liga and he has racked up 6 assists in the way.
Image: Nelson Semedo poses with the Barcelona shirt after completing the transfer #fcblive pic.twitter.com/SlgdgIo0CK
— Barcastuff (@barcastuff__) July 14, 2017
He is an exciting new prospect and valuable addition to Barcelona’s squad next season. He may not be the new Dani Alves but Barcelona might have got the next big thing in the world of football.
