Youssoufa Moukoko

Status
Not open for further replies.
Mainoldo said:
I think Reus makes great business sense for squad depth. Imagine rotating him with Guarnacho and Antony.
Click to expand...
A bit unlikely as he rarely plays on the wings these days, but usually as the 10.

Elanga on loan could make sense if United doesn't want to sell him and if Dortmund wants another talented player in the squad now while they are not sure about the future (let's face it, they are a bit of in a mess tactically and having question marks like how Haller will come back doesn't make squad planning easier for them).
 
stefan92 said:
A bit unlikely as he rarely plays on the wings these days, but usually as the 10.

Elanga on loan could make sense if United doesn't want to sell him and if Dortmund wants another talented player in the squad now while they are not sure about the future (let's face it, they are a bit of in a mess tactically and having question marks like how Haller will come back doesn't make squad planning easier for them).
Click to expand...

Oh does he.

Suppose it can still work with DVB being out for the season. But would prefer someone who can cover all fronts of attack.
 
Mainoldo said:
What does he say.

Also I don’t think we should touch him if he’s really 22. Changes everything.
Click to expand...

Maybe, but whether he is 18 or 22, its a fact that all kids develop at a different pace. You should never sign someone "just" because they are 18, some are done growing when they are 14 and others when they are 20. If Moukokou was indeed 18 y/o, we can certainly rule out that he has any physical "youth growth" left in him anyway. Same with Bellingham. Bellingham is 19 y/o. He was at a stage in his development when he was 16, that many others hit when they are 20. You shouldn't buy Bellingham either, expecting him to be a high World Cup level of player at 19 y/o who therefor per automatic will be much better when he is 22. Any player can always develop, but never at the same rate as they do during that growth spurt at

My point is just, in any event, we must do our due diligence on this kid and evaluate how good we think that he can become. This is a kid who broker records at the U17 level when he was 12. 6 years later, he isn't going to grow physically. He is what, the same height now that he was when he was 15? Some kid can easily grow 3-4 inches after their turned 16. A kid like Wayne Rooney who was as developed as he was at 16 y/o, was of course never going to become like 6'3. It all comes down to whether we think he has enough ability and growth potential today -- regardless of his age. I just don't see how it should have any impact to be honest.
 
Messier1994 said:
Maybe, but whether he is 18 or 22, its a fact that all kids develop at a different pace. You should never sign someone "just" because they are 18, some are done growing when they are 14 and others when they are 20. If Moukokou was indeed 18 y/o, we can certainly rule out that he has any physical "youth growth" left in him anyway. Same with Bellingham. Bellingham is 19 y/o. He was at a stage in his development when he was 16, that many others hit when they are 20. You shouldn't buy Bellingham either, expecting him to be a high World Cup level of player at 19 y/o who therefor per automatic will be much better when he is 22. Any player can always develop, but never at the same rate as they do during that growth spurt at

My point is just, in any event, we must do our due diligence on this kid and evaluate how good we think that he can become. This is a kid who broker records at the U17 level when he was 12. 6 years later, he isn't going to grow physically. He is what, the same height now that he was when he was 15? Some kid can easily grow 3-4 inches after their turned 16. A kid like Wayne Rooney who was as developed as he was at 16 y/o, was of course never going to become like 6'3. It all comes down to whether we think he has enough ability and growth potential today -- regardless of his age. I just don't see how it should have any impact to be honest.
Click to expand...
There’s a difference between having 11 career goals as an 18 year old compared to a 22 year old, especially when the reputation comes from his goal record at underage level when he’s in his 20s v kids!
 
cyberman said:
There’s a difference between having 11 career goals as an 18 year old compared to a 22 year old, especially when the reputation comes from his goal record at underage level when he’s in his 20s v kids!
Click to expand...
It comes from breaking records against older players. At worst he broke records while being the usual age for the league (meaning getting the U19 scoring record as a 19 year old like everyone else playing there, not as a 15 year old). Still a sign of a great talent, even if the accusations should be true.
 
cyberman said:
There’s a difference between having 11 career goals as an 18 year old compared to a 22 year old, especially when the reputation comes from his goal record at underage level when he’s in his 20s v kids!
Click to expand...

But there shouldn't be! ;)

If you look at an 18 y/o who got a full beard and haven't grown at all since he was 14 y/o, you shouldn't expect a ton of development "just because he is 18". If you OTOH have a super thin kid who is 5'7 with two parents who are 6-6'2 and a bunch of brothers who are around 6'2 and kept growing until they were 20 y/o, you should be ecstatic if he is at a fairly high level at 17 y/o, because he should have a lot of growth potential left in him.
 
stefan92 said:
It comes from breaking records against older players. At worst he broke records while being the usual age for the league (meaning getting the U19 scoring record as a 19 year old like everyone else playing there, not as a 15 year old). Still a sign of a great talent, even if the accusations should be true.
Click to expand...
But the u 19 is one example that really has any sort of substance.
If records are correct then his u17 record came as a near twenty year old. Think how many younger players are playing in u17 who are moved up from an even younger age because of talent or the players who left that age bracket to move up.
It’s ridiculous. We have u 21 so not even u 19 who are scoring plenty of goals until everybody else catches up physically then slows way down. We have two prime examples of this in our 21 team right now.
Nobody is saying he’s a bad player but his goal record shrinks so much if he’s so much older than he is to the point he’s wasted a lot of development of whatever talent he has playing against kids when he should be playing against men and senior level.
 
cyberman said:
But the u 19 is one example that really has any sort of substance.
If records are correct then his u17 record came as a near twenty year old. Think how many younger players are playing in u17 who are moved up from an even younger age because of talent or the players who left that age bracket to move up.
It’s ridiculous. We have u 21 so not even u 19 who are scoring plenty of goals until everybody else catches up physically then slows way down. We have two prime examples of this in our 21 team right now.
Nobody is saying he’s a bad player but his goal record shrinks so much if he’s so much older than he is to the point he’s wasted a lot of development of whatever talent he has playing against kids when he should be playing against men and senior level.
Click to expand...
Agree on that post, but before you posted that he played kids while being in his twenties. Now you are saying "near twenty" and that's correct in the case that he really is 22 now.
 


Staying at Dortmund. Good choice I think.
 
Only signing a contract until 2026. Obviously just wants to develop a bit more and leave Dortmund in one or two years.
 
unplayable said:
Only signing a contract until 2026. Obviously just wants to develop a bit more and leave Dortmund in one or two years.
Click to expand...
If he only wants to stay for a year or two, he shouldn't be signing a 3 year contract. Leaving now he would have got a signing on fee, whereas Dortmund will ask for £60m for him next year if he wants to leave. For his sake, he should have put a low buyout clause in there (even if limited to United).
 
If I remember correctly there was a document which revealed he's actually 4 years older than he claims which would make him 23 and not 19 as he claims.

Considering he refused the osseous exam I think it's pretty much safe to say he's tricked his age. That's why all the hype about him died, nobody in the world of football believes he's a youngster. Even Dortmund stop playing him in the last years.
 
GlazersHater said:
If I remember correctly there was a document which revealed he's actually 4 years older than he claims which would make him 23 and not 19 as he claims.

Considering he refused the osseous exam I think it's pretty much safe to say he's tricked his age. That's why all the hype about him died, nobody in the world of football believes he's a youngster. Even Dortmund stop playing him in the last years.
Click to expand...

There is no way he's four years older than he claims. Moukoko has been in the news since he is 12 or so. It's one thing to pretend you're 17 or 18 when you are actually in your early 20s but there is no way a 16 year old is mistaken for an 11 year ols.

At best, he's two years older than he claims which would mean that his unreal statistics in youth leagues weren't against much older but slightly older opponents considering he played against opponents three years older than his official age.
 
Zehner said:
There is no way he's four years older than he claims. Moukoko has been in the news since he is 11 or so. It's one thing to pretend you're 17 or 18 when you are actually in your early 20s but there is no way a 15 year old is mistaken for an 11 year ols.

At best, he's two years older than he claims which would mean that his unreal statistics in youth leagues weren't against much older opponents. Still very impressive. So in the worst case, you have a 21 year old who last season scored a goal every 120 minutes.
Click to expand...

When I was a kid, there was a kid who played in my age group (U10) at my club who was actually 14. I was 9 at the time. He played with us through two age groups until his family moved to a different city. He was the best player on our team, also the strongest, the tallest, the fastest etc. I don't think teachers and coaches knew, or maybe they did and that's why he had to leave, but he wasn't particularly secretive about his real age when he was around us. We were smashing teams for fun for 2 and half years while we had this older lad on our team.
 
WeePat said:
When I was a kid, there was a kid who played in my age group (U10) at my club who was actually 14. I was 9 at the time. He played with us through two age groups until his family moved to a different city. He was the best player on our team, also the strongest, the tallest, the fastest etc. I don't think teachers and coaches knew, or maybe they did and that's why he had to leave, but he wasn't particularly secretive about his real age when he was around us. We were smashing teams for fun for 2 and half years while we had this older lad on our team.
Click to expand...
:lol: :lol: :lol:

There's a massive difference between a 9/10 year old and somebody who is actually 14. Those teachers and coaches would have to have been incredibly shit at their job to not notice. They 100% knew.
 
I don't believe the age stuff, I think it's just an easy way to bash him because he looks older. He reminds me of Moises Kean, who also looked prodigious in his teenage years, but never quite lived up to the hype at senior level.
 
He is nothing special....that is the point.....his level is maybe Augsburg and surely not a club like Barca (if you listen to the words of his agent).
 
Superunknown said:
:lol: :lol: :lol:

There's a massive difference between a 9/10 year old and somebody who is actually 14. Those teachers and coaches would have to have been incredibly shit at their job to not notice. They 100% knew.
Click to expand...

I suspect they did too in retrospect but I suppose theyd have no way of proving it if he had documents saying he was 9. This was in the late 90s. He was bigger than us but he was kinda small for his age.
 
WeePat said:
When I was a kid, there was a kid who played in my age group (U10) at my club who was actually 14. I was 9 at the time. He played with us through two age groups until his family moved to a different city. He was the best player on our team, also the strongest, the tallest, the fastest etc. I don't think teachers and coaches knew, or maybe they did and that's why he had to leave, but he wasn't particularly secretive about his real age when he was around us. We were smashing teams for fun for 2 and half years while we had this older lad on our team.
Click to expand...
I mean, isn't that rather confirmation of what I said when everybody knew it? You can't hide such an age gap. Moukoko by the way was never among the biggest in his teams, he was actually smaller than most in the highlight videos I've seen.


BabySinclair said:
He is nothing special....that is the point.....his level is maybe Augsburg and surely not a club like Barca (if you listen to the words of his agent).
Click to expand...
I think that's a bit harsh. Moukoko has an excellent first touch, is a decent dribbler, a very capable finisher with both feet and is reasonably strong. Most Dortmund fans didn't understand why he played so little and there are quite a few who think he is better than Füllkrug - and to be honest, I kind of agree with them from what I've seen last season. His primary issue (besides subpar coaching in the last two to three years) was that he'd probably be best in a shadow striker role which doesn't exist at Dortmund. Terzic seemed to believe he can't play as a lone striker despite him doing relatively fine there. He'll probably end up at a club that plays a shadow striker like Lautaro Martinez for instance or turn into a wide goal scoring forward.
 
Acrobat7 said:
Well, he was dating an 18 year old girl when he was "12"... :lol:
Click to expand...

I think most people will generally agree that he is probably older than he claims but four years is so much time at this age and Moukoko was basically a celebrity since he was 12. Maybe he was 14 dating an 18 year old back then, the same way Luke Littler dated a 22 year old when he was 17. But if you can follow a player that closely from such a young age as it was the case with Moukoko, I think there are natural limits to how much younger you can pretend to be.
 
Zehner said:
I think most people will generally agree that he is probably older than he claims but four years is so much time at this age and Moukoko was basically a celebrity since he was 12. Maybe he was 14 dating an 18 year old back then, the same way Luke Littler dated a 22 year old when he was 17. But if you can follow a player that closely from such a young age as it was the case with Moukoko, I think there are natural limits to how much younger you can pretend to be.
Click to expand...
I agree with you and Moukoko was never someone that destroyed his competition due to his superior physicality.
But dating a 22yo as a 17yo is still very different to him being maybe 14 and her being 18...
 
Acrobat7 said:
I agree with you and Moukoko was never someone that destroyed his competition due to his superior physicality.
But dating a 22yo as a 17yo is still very different to him being maybe 14 and her being 18...
Click to expand...

No doubt. I just wanted to point out that I don't agree with the reasoning "she's 18, he must have been 16 at least" but it goes without saying that 18 and 14 or even 12 is more problematic than 22 and 17.
 
Acrobat7 said:
Well, he was dating an 18 year old girl when he was "12"... :lol:
Click to expand...
That this story was never debunked (at least to my knowledge) has always been quite telling to me. I usually stay always from these age discussions as far as possible, due to the underlying racism at play. In the case of Moukoko however, I tend to share the skepticism of many others. It just doesn’t add up to me.
 
Zehner said:
I think most people will generally agree that he is probably older than he claims but four years is so much time at this age and Moukoko was basically a celebrity since he was 12. Maybe he was 14 dating an 18 year old back then, the same way Luke Littler dated a 22 year old when he was 17. But if you can follow a player that closely from such a young age as it was the case with Moukoko, I think there are natural limits to how much younger you can pretend to be.
Click to expand...

I think it’s certainly possible he’s four years older than his official age. He was playing against u13 players when he was 9 or 10 and he was always one of the tallest players in group of mostly 12/13 year olds.



https://www.espn.co.uk/football/sto...ukoko-hits-16-goals-seven-games-dortmund-u17s

16 goals in 7 games at U17 level as a 12 year old…. Impossible. No 12 year old would be that good. I don’t know why any club would buy him for such a large fee when it’s incredibly likely he’s a good few years older than his official age.
 
Guys this isn’t the football forum. Threads should be related to transfer tweets. If you want to discuss his age, his haircut or whatever else take it to the football forum.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.