Former Barcelona youth coach lavishes praise on Lamine Yamal – ‘You know there’s something special’

“When such a young player shows something different, especially qualities that are rare at that age, you know there’s something special. And that’s what happened with Lamine,” Saviola acknowledged.

Javier Saviola worked with Lamine Yamal at La Masia. (Photo by Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images)

Continuing, he admitted: “We weren’t worried about his footballing ability, but rather how to manage him, because we knew that in the future he would have a great chance of making it into Barça’s first team.”

Although Yamal attracted most of the attention, Saviola highlighted that the squad he worked with included several other promising players, while also crediting former Barcelona manager Xavi Hernandez for spotting their talent and taking them up.

“Alongside Yamal, there were also Hector Fort and two or three other players. It really was an exceptional process that even Xavi spotted straight away and asked us for references on him,” the Argentine stated.

“From then on, we started working with him, and we were very proud, because we managed to get five or six players into very important teams at such a young age.”

“Seeing them succeed with the tools we tried to provide them with was a huge achievement. Honestly, it was an extraordinary job,” he explained.