Wonderkid Factories: SL Benfica
Our first trip to Portugal in the wonderkid factories series, takes us to Benfica, a renowned producer of exciting young players. For those of our readers that play Football Manager, you’ll know that the Lisbon based club is always a good place to look for high quality newgens.
FM has good reason though for making it a hotspot for young players, considering that Benfica have produced enough players to have one of the best squads in world football if they had all stayed.
As Aguias (The Eagles) are one of the big three clubs in Portugal alongside Porto and Sporting Lisbon, and have never been relegated from the Portuguese top flight. The club has a history of producing top class players with the likes of Rui Costa, Luisao and Eusebio all ex-Benfica players. The Reds have also won a record 37 Portuguese league titles, 26 Portuguese Cups and 2 back to back European Cups in the 1960’s.
It’s no surprise then, that the club’s Seixal Futebol Campus is a hub for the bright and brilliant of Portugal’s young players. Pedro Marques, the club’s Technical Director, has been responsible for overseeing the prolific production of players from the academy and has talked at length about the ‘four pillars’ of Benfica’s youth policy that has allowed them to be so successful.
The four pillars are scouting, methodology, competition and opportunities and are meant to pave a pathway to the first team for any player. Unlike at some other clubs academies such as Chelsea, the players at Benfica are almost always guaranteed a try in the first team given that they make the necessary development to play at that level.
To demonstrate just how effective the club have been at developing young players here is a list of the illustrious talent to come out of Seixal- Ruben Dias, Bernardo Silva, Ederson, Nelson Semedo, Ferro, Joao Cancelo, Renato Sanches, Florentino, Andre Gomes, Joao Felix, Goncalo Guedes, Fabio Silva, Danilo Pereira, Gedson Fernandes, Helder Costa, Jose Sa, Ivan Cavaleiro and Nuno Tavares.
As we said, they’ve produced more than enough talented players to have a squad of their own that could compete for major European silverware.
Once again we’ve also taken a look at some of the players who might step up and become the next in a long line of fabulous talent.
Morato (Centre Back)
Morato has made a breakthrough into Benfica’s first team this season, appearing in both the league and Champions League already. At just 20, he has the ability to follow in the footsteps of some his predecessors such as Dias in becoming a top class defender.
Diogo Nascimento (Central Midfielder)
Nascimento is the youngest player on this list at only 18 but has already appeared twice for Portugal’s U20 team. He’s come all the way through the ranks at Benfica and although he is yet to break into the first team, he is making a big splash for the U23 team and developing nicely. He also has the distinction of being well rated by the powers that be on Football Manager.
Goncalo Ramos (Second Striker)
Another 20 year old who has broken into the first team this season, Ramos has already shown he is ready to play at the highest level. He’s featured in the Portuguese top flight five times already, collecting an assist, and has made a brief appearance in the Champions League as well. Ramos also has an unbelievable record for Portugal’s U21’s scoring 6 times in just 11 appearances.