‘Genius’ Felix can shape up to be the next Ronaldo
Despite a red-card debut for Chelsea, the Portuguese is a rare talent say the coaches who started him at Benfica
Bruno Lage says he is the only man to have coached every age-group side in the Benfica academy, as well as the Benfica B team who play in Liga 2, and, of course, the first team in one of the club’s greatest seasons – the league title of 2018-19. That triumph is remembered for one player above all: that rare talent, Joao Felix.
Chelsea’s loan signing from Atletico Madrid, who sparkled on his debut at Craven Cottage on Jan 12, before an unexpected red card, is back in action tomorrow after a three-game suspension. In the intervening 22 days, Chelsea have broken the British transfer record amid the biggest January spend in history and Felix (right) comes back into a side who have changed considerably. The memory of his first 60 minutes in English football, however, remains strong.
Among those watching from afar was Lage, Wolverhampton Wanderers manager until October, who launched the career of the 23-yearold now regarded as the man to succeed Cristiano Ronaldo as Portugal’s greatest talent.
They worked together for just six months, but what a time it was. Felix was the crown jewel in a Benfica side who took 55 points from a possible 57 in the second half of the season to beat Porto to the title by two points.
Felix departed to Atletico that summer for €126million – the second-highest fee paid for a teenager. His fortunes in Spain in the years that followed were rather more mixed.
In January 2019, the first thing Lage did was change Benfica’s system. “They played 4-3-3 and I changed to 4-4-2 because that was the right system for Joao,” he says.
“He’s not a No10. He’s not one to play behind the striker. I prefer to call him the ‘free striker’. He needs to play with a more orthodox striker who is in the box, a guy that Joao can find with passes. Joao plays between the lines, and in the space behind a defence. Him and [Swiss striker, Haris] Seferovic in that second half of the season – they were very good.”
Felix was the fifth-choice striker when Lage took over. By April, when he scored a hat-trick against Eintracht Frankfurt in the Europa League, he was one of the hottest properties in Europe. Lage remembers a boy very much at home at the club who would walk to the training ground from his digs half a mile away. He had been there since the age of 14 after a period at Porto.
Some claim Porto released him, others that he had left of his own accord. Either way Benfica had a player who was in huge demand.
The Felix question was occupying another senior figure at the club. Tiago Pinto was just 32 when he was asked to step up to become the club’s director of football having previously managed the other sports teams competing under the
Benfica banner. The acceleration in Felix’s form from January
2019 onwards meant that the club faced tough decisions sooner than expected.
Pinto is now the sporting director at
Roma in
Serie A. He admits he was initially reluctant to speak when
Telegraph
Sport called, but he makes an exception in this case. “I know with what has happened at Atletico and with the red card [against Fulham] it’s not a good moment for him [Felix] but, man, this guy is a genius and a very humble person. He’s not a normal footballer. There is a lot of natural talent and a high confidence in himself. He makes everything seem very easy.
“We had a video at Benfica which we always used to laugh at – it was Joao’s first touch as a first-team player. Most teenagers would just not want to make a mistake but he did something really artistic. It’s in his nature. His mother and father were both teachers, a very good family. They knew the boy was very are of a boy whom they only ever saw wearing his training kit. “Benfica shorts, Benfica T-shirt, eating with his friends from the academy in the canteen,” he says.
At the time as his manager, Lage was outspoken about Felix’s immediate future: he said Felix should stay another year at Benfica. “He was a young man, just 19. He would walk from training to school, having lunch in the club canteen. The next minute you are in another club in another city. You are not considered young anymore. You are the main man and the player they spent €126million on.”
Pinto recalls a transfer like no other. “It was a really high level between the two club presidents and [agent] Jorge Mendes and eventually it was €126 million, which was the buyout clause. Now people say, ‘Oh, maybe Atletico wasn’t right for him, there were other clubs interested’. At the time, it was something that happened so fast and I am sure that Atletico wanted to convince him that they were the right place.
“Maybe Joao was too young but he was doing things that were so special and the whole world was looking at him. When you look at Joao he is a technical, dynamic player. I don’t want to be that guy who says now that he would have been better off at Barcelona, Paris St-germain or Manchester City. In the end it was the decision of everybody.”
A sense of what might have been. Benfica struggled to replicate their form the next season and Lage was sacked. Pinto is in no doubt that Chelsea and Graham Potter would be a good match for Felix. “He just needs the right context. He needs a coach and technical staff who like him and protect him. Sometimes these guys need someone to treat them a bit differently.”
Lage says that Felix’s progress demonstrated the power of Benfica’s academy. The club made a decision from around 2012 to make developing players a priority. It has yielded stunning results. Lage’s own record with young players is very good too, and his pride at the development of Max Kilman at Wolves is just as great as it is for those other Portuguese luminaries he helped along the way.
“A young player has to accept that if they work hard they will get a place in the team,” Lage says. “And the manager has to give him a proper opportunity. Not just one game to show everything you can do. Like with Joao, you need the time to be calm and play in games the same way that you train every day.”