Just watched some 3 minutes of YouTube highlights. This guy is going to be the greatest ever Watford player. Unless the people who created the highlight reel are not giving the full picture, in which case, I haven’t a clue how this will end.
Not that random - this deal was mentioned as supposedly being on the cards back in the summer but it seems we had to wait until he turned 18 yesterday before making it official : https://wfcforums.com/index.php?threads/mamadou-doumbia.60445/ It's true though that it's fairly unusual that such a rumour has indeed come to fruition and he'll actually be coming here (unless he gets shipped out again immediately like the dud Djibril Toure).
He'll be loaned out to Belgium in the summer, become an Udinese player without anything being announced the summer after, then immediately back to Belgium where Charleroi will sign him for 500k before we re-sign him the next day for £5m.
I'll post this highlights vid again of him from the youth Afcon last year, which is presumably where we scouted him. While it can be difficult to gauge given the nature of the competition, my initial impression is that he seems a very good prospect who we've done well to get: The club seem to think so too given the 6 year deal.
Big question is will we actually see him next season ? Tweet from last August .. https://twitter.com/VoicesOfTheVic/status/1687062646003003392
Presumably an ESC player? In which case to get him a work permit 12 months down the line we’d have to play him. https://analyticsfc.co.uk/blog/2023...be-guidance-opens-up-recruitment-post-brexit/
That tweet was what started the thread which I quoted above. The fact that he's ended up signing for us on a 6 year deal with us making an official announcement would suggest that he will. Maybe the reason for the initial idea that he might go to Udinese first then be loaned here could have been that maybe he was able to legally able to sign the pre-contract with Udinese before he turned 18 but not with us, but with the plan always being he would switch to us as soon as it was possible.
Look forward to him starting for us in the 26/27 season. Although we will need to manage his minutes that season because apparently 20 year olds in peak condition can’t play a full season at our club.
Not a like for like replacement tbf. He successfully held the ball up at least once in his highlight reel.
Yes presumably he'd be an ESC player. I suppose one reason why we might loan him to Udinese or Belgium for 6 months to make 1 senior appearance, is so that next season he'd no longer take up an ESC slot if we're not going to play him here much yet. That reminds me, another reason why we might be running Rajovic in to the ground this season is so that he's no longer taking up one of our non-work permit qualifying player slots next season. We should still have at least 2 non work permit slots for next season though for at least Rajovic and Doumbia, but I'm sure the club would rather Rajovic not be taking one up next season.
Careful giving an opinion here people…. There’s a fair chance it’ll get randomly quoted in 12 months time. Or ignored if you happen to be right.
If other posters have made predictions that have been met with such disagreement and mockery by a significant chunk of other forum members, but then turned out to actually be correct, then by all means they can mention it as well when it comes to pass. Also, it's not as if I've always ignored other posters who've made similar such predictions; eg I gave credit a while ago to you and barely1egal for being basically the only two other posters to have not been convinced by the Louza signing: https://wfcforums.com/index.php?threads/imran-louza.58433/page-3#post-3039848
According to this article: https://footballtalentscout.net/2023/05/23/mamadou-doumbia/ He has "good pace over long distances". He's a reverse Gimli.
Hopefully has a better career than the last Malian 17 year old we signed, who had just won the prize for third best player in the u17 World Cup. Came from the same club in Mali (Black Stars), never played for us but did play a bit on loan at Granada then permanently transferred to Udinese where he never played but was loaned out three times. Now at a mid table team in Romania's top flight. Can anyone name that player?
FFS why do they come up with all this complicated ****??? No wonder people become lawyers as they probably make a fortune out of comi g up with all this complicated gobbledgook!!!
Let’s close the thread now, Rousey boy has given his opinion so thats exactly how this signing will turn out and nobody will ever be able to suggest anything that differs from that, including themself. “my initial impression is that he seems a very good prospect who we've done well to get” This is the collective forum view now and please don’t anybody think about suggesting otherwise, ever.
He looks like a huge talent, but we can't pin our hope on an 18year old, who hasn't played a minute in a senior league yet. he has to be given time to develop, to grow and to learn. Lets not over use him, develop him and not expect too much to soon.
It is very difficult to tell from a short clip however does anyone else see similarities with João Pedro ?
I’m very wary of highlights clips. I heard a bloke who had retired from making film trailers. He admitted he could make an impressive trailer for even the worst of films by hunting through the film for its best 60 seconds. Queue some very disappointed movie goers.
