Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain has been impressed with new Liverpool signing Fabio Carvalho.
Having been signed this summer, Carvalho joined up with his new teammates for the first time on Monday. And speaking to LFCTV after training yesterday, Oxlade-Chamberlain was asked for his thoughts on the 19-year-old.
“Fab (Carvalho), he’s obviously a young player, very technically gifted,” said Liverpool’s number 15.
“I saw a few little bits from him at Fulham last year and from guys I know there they all speak very highly of him. I’m sure we’re going to see him learn from a lot of the boys round here and settle in.”
No need to rush, but big things expected
Carvalho looks to have all the tools to develop into an excellent little player.
As Oxlade-Chamberlain alludes to, having forwards like Mohamed Salah and Roberto Firmino to learn from is only going to make him better.
As with any young player though, it’s important not to rush the teenager’s development.
For most Liverpool fans, all they’ll have seen from Carvalho is from well put together YouTube compilations. Although handy to display a player’s qualities, these can sometimes lead to skewed expectations.
The reality is that Carvalho is still only nineteen and has just joined one of the best football teams on the planet. He may need time.
Initially, it looks as though Jurgen Klopp plans to use him in the domestic cup competitions. With Takumi Minamino and Divock Origi now gone, he’ll likely be expected to hoover up their minutes.
But if he can make an impression over the next handful of weeks, perhaps he can force his way into a bigger role. As was the case with Harvey Elliott last year, if you’re good enough, Klopp will throw you in.
That shouldn’t be expected of Carvalho. He seems like an ambitious young man though, and when you couple ambition with talent, big things can happen. Oxlade-Chamberlain has been impressed so far, and he surely won’t have been the only one.
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