Another Boy Sensation?

Sergio Canales, like Theo Walcott (above) is a young soccer sensation.

Sergio Canales, will he be another Walcott or a World Cup wonder?

In case you haven’t heard of him, the 18-year-old Racing Santander striker is currently the talk of Spanish football’s chattering classes after he exploded onto the scene two months ago with an outstanding performance off-the-bench against Real Madrid in November.

Even though his efforts on that occasion were in a losing cause – although he did find the net against the Spanish giants only to be questionably ruled offside – spectacular goals since then against Espanyol, Sevilla and two weeks ago against Valladolid have lead to Canales being boosted, at least in the public eye, from the status of just being another prodigious youngster to a serious contender for a place in next summer’s World Cup squad.

Even Spain’s national coach Vicente Del Bosque has admitted that the possibility he could take him to South Africa isn’t an absurd notion.

“Canales is enormously competent and his age isn’t an impediment. The only problem is that the national team has an enormous depth in this position,” commented Del Bosque.

If any confirmation of Canales’ ability was needed, with his contract at Racing up at the end of the season and the Cantabrian club unable to meet the salary demands of his agent (who is also his father), he looks certain to sign a multi-million euro contract with Real Madrid in the coming days.

Clearly, there is a danger in lauding a player to the skies after only started a handful of La Liga games.

Other Youthful Players

It’s not so long ago that similar praise from all and sundry was being heaped on Barcelona’s Bojan Krkic who, it’s worth remembering, is still only 19.

After a sensational debut season two years ago, when he scored 10 goals, a tug-of-love developed between the then Spanish national coach Luis Aragones and his Serbian counterpart Radomir Antic, as Krkic’s parents came from Serbia.

Krkic made his one and only appearance for Spain to date in September 2008, a 4-0 win over Armenia in the World Cup qualifiers, but little has been seen or heard of him in recent months as he has fallen down order at the reigning Spanish and European champions.

There will now be no place for Krkic at the World Cup, an event which has a habit of putting truly talented teenagers into the spotlight.

Few football fans, even those more reliant of Wikipedia than their memories, will not know that it was at the 1958 World Cup in Sweden when a 17-year-old Brazilian called Pele first drew global acclaim.

Manchester United’s Norman Whiteside broke Pele’s record as the youngest player to appear at the World Cup in 1982 in Spain – an accolade since passed onto Cameroon’s Samuel Eto’o in 1998 – and, despite not quite possessing the same silky skills, he started all five of Northern Ireland’s games and established his reputation as an outstanding midfielder-cum-striker.

Four years ago in Germany, the British media might still have been obsessing about Theo Walcott’s idiosyncratic inclusion by Sven Goran Eriksson but the rest of the world was being thrilled by a young man wearing number 19 for Argentina, Barcelona’s Lionel Messi.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Courtesy of BBC Sport’s Phil Minshull

HAVE YOUR SAY: Sergio Canales, will he be another Walcott or a World Cup wonder or fade into oblivion? Is youthfulness, but inexperience, good in a World Cup?