The talented Spanish teenager left Manchester City behind.
Joan Angel Roman has left Manchester City and signed with Barcelona, the Spanish club have announced on their official website.
The Spaniard signed with Manchester City in 2009 from Espanyol, and now 19 hopes he has made the right move for the sake of his career.
You can hardly blame any player, especially a Catalan who says Andres Iniesta is his idol, for signing a dream deal with Barcelona.
Roman is clearly talented – described on fan forums as ‘pure class’, yet his path to the Manchester City first team was never going to be easy, and had yet to play a first team game.
He is an attacking playmaker who can play as a winger or centrally, best compared with fellow Spaniard David Silva, but City’s intense competition for places meant that even next season, the chances of game time would be remote.
His highlight was a hat-trick scored in late March for City’s Elite Development Squad against Morecambe, starring alongside a returning Carlos Tevez.
The flip side of City’s riches and success, as Chelsea have found out to their cost over the years, is that opportunities for youngsters can diminish.
Promising striker John Guidetti is unsure over the chances he will receive next season, and is already being linked away with a move, both permanently and on loan.
Manchester City have been striving to push youth development, and have grand plans for an academy to better Barcelona’s famous La Masia complex. Patrick Vieira is overseeing the talent development, and he will surely be disappointed to see Roman depart.
City lost all six NextGen Series games last year, with Roman a part of the team, and will hope for improvement in next season’s expanded competition aimed at promoting youth development.
Roman will likely develop well at Barcelona, and feature for their B team next season, and as a Spanish youth international could go on eventually to be one of the next big Spanish stars if he carries on his development.
At City he was more a victim of circumstance, like Gerard Pique at Manchester United. competition blocking his path to the first team made the offer to return to his homeland inevitable, but sooner or later one of City’s talented youngsters is going to have to grasp the mettle and break through, and the club and Roberto Mancini need to do all they can to smooth the path.
Will City regret losing Roman? Who will be the City academy star to break through?
image: © markhillary
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