Spain sensation Lamine Yamal has been hailed by former England striker Gary Lineker ahead of Sunday's Euro 2024 final
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Former England striker Gary Lineker has heaped praise on Spain sensation Lamine Yamal ahead of Sunday's Euro 2024 final.
Yamal scored a wonderful goal against France in Spain's semi-final win over Les Bleus on Tuesday and has impressed throughout the tournament at just 16 years of age.
The Barcelona attacker, who turned 17 on Saturday, will spearhead Spain's hopes of a fourth European Championship crown on Sunday as La Roja face England in the final in Berlin.
How Spain's Lamine Yamal Just DESTROYED France
"Lamine Yamal blows my mind. To do the sort of stuff he is doing at his age is incredible," Lineker told The Guardian in an interview.
"I remember the emergence of Wayne Rooney. You could tell he was special but even he didn’t do this. Pelé scored two in a World Cup final but he was 17, nearly 18. Even [Lionel] Messi didn’t really emerge internationally until his late teens. What we’re seeing here is something very, very special.
"How special, we will have to wait and see. To do what he is doing: I can’t quite get my head around it."
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(Image credit: Getty Images)
Lineker also joked that at Yamal's age, he was definitely not a grown man. "I hadn't reached puberty yet," he said.
And later, he added: "I was 18 at Leicester and very conscious of being a kid. I wasn’t joking about puberty. I really did hide in the showers and stuff. I didn’t feel like a man. It was quite hard. I scored goals but it wasn’t until I was 21, 22 that I started to feel comfortable in that environment. At 16?! And it's not: 'This kid has talent, let's try him.' No. He has played consistently, as if it was the easiest thing in the world.
"I’ve not seen anything like this. Messi is from another planet and I don’t think you want to put that [comparison] on him, but there's no question that if Lamine keeps his feet on the ground and doesn't have serious injuries, he is going to be very special indeed. He already is: if you judge the players at this tournament and age is nothing to do with it, he would be top three or four. At 16 … he's a child!
"Some kids live up to the expectations, a lot don't. But with this kind of talent, I would be surprised if we don’t see some kind of greatness."
Ben Hayward is the Weekend Editor of FourFourTwo. A European football writer and Tottenham Hotspur fan with over 15 years’ experience, he has covered games all over the world - including three World Cups, several Champions League finals, Euros, Copa America - and has spent much of that time in Spain. Ben speaks English and Spanish, currently dividing his time between Barcelona and London, covering all the big talking points of the weekend on FFT: he’s also written several list features and interviewed Guglielmo Vicario for the magazine.
