The difficult financial situation in many of Brazil's top clubs has led to young players being sold very early to clubs in Europe.
Manchester City will soon welcome the latest member of the Brazilian contingent. Ederson, Fernandinho and Gabriel Jesus will no doubt be tasked with making youngster Kayky feel at home after the talented striker completes his €18 million move from Fluminense at the end of the year, when he will also turn XNUMX years.
With only a few games at Fluminense, the striker is a bet for City.
But the transfer also has the other side of the coin. Assessments for the future of the game in the post-football country are worrying. It is becoming increasingly difficult for even the biggest clubs to keep hold of their promising players.
"He came, charmed us, made an impression and left. Kayky was sold to Manchester City like a few sacks of soybeans", wrote the journalist of "Tribuna de Minas", Gabriel Ferreira Borges. In a column, he harshly criticized the sale of Brazilian talents at a very young age.
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Kayky and team-mate Metinho, another City target according to Borges, “will have different fortunes in the City Football Group 'Russian Roulette' game. The future is a game of chance between Lommel and Girona.
Kayky, who was closely watched by the club before making his debut for Fluminense in early 2021. Reports in Brazil suggest he was signed before he ever set foot on the pitch at senior level. Kayky is at least expected to be retained by City once he arrives in England.
For Metinho, 18, and with just one first-team appearance, another destination awaits.
France's Troyes are expected to cash in on the talent after a final deal is reached between Fluminense and City. Once the deal is signed, Metinho will be sent straight out on loan - possibly without ever seeing the Etihad Stadium.
Fluminense, meanwhile, will have to start afresh after developing these two talents for years and, in Metinho's case, even secure a home so he can move from the notorious favela run by the Cinco gang Bocas, in which his family left the Democratic Republic of Congo when the player was a baby. The family left because of religious persecution.
Millions in transfer fees will provide ample compensation for the club. Of course, such transfers are nothing new. Real Madrid have led the way in recent years when it comes to snapping up Brazilian talent, signing Flamengo duo Vinicius Junior and Reinier and Rodrygo and Santos.
City themselves stepped in in 2017 to buy Gabriel Jesus, then just 20 years old. There is a small but important difference between those deals and the one that will bring Kaykyn and Metinho to Europe. All four mentioned above had ample first-team experience in both Serie A and the Copa Libertadores, with Jesus winning trophies with Palmeiras and playing two full seasons before moving to Europe.
Kayky has only a few senior appearances, mostly in the state leagues. His individual effort against Novo Iguacus in April may have grabbed the headlines, but it's worth noting that Fluminense's opponents weren't even in the Brazilian league pyramid and achieved promotion to the state championship in Rio last year.
Even prospective football players stabilized in the first teams can fail after the transition to Europe. Such was the case of Marlos Moreno, who burst onto the scene with Atletico Nacional in Colombia and quickly secured a move to City a few weeks after his 20th birthday after lifting the Copa Libertadores trophy in 2016. Morenos, however, he was never given a chance to shine at the Etihad Stadium. He is now on his sixth loan in five years, this time at Lommel in the Belgian second division, where the striker's career appears to have stalled completely.
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"How nice it will be to be coached by Guardiola," said Moreno when he signed for City.
Now, with his contract expiring in the summer, that ambition looks set to remain unfulfilled.
So great is the financial disparity between the Premier Leagues elite and Brazil's biggest clubs that such deals can hardly fail.
More than ten teams from the three top tiers of English football are currently involved in the pursuit of young talent across South America.
"English clubs have had departments watching Colombian players who first move to Belgium or Holland," said Simon Edwards, who advises clubs and agents on the South American market. "Now it is much easier for most Colombian players to move to League One than in Holland because of the work permit rules. I think the Championship is the most interesting destination for players who go outside of Argentina and Brazil."
Another factor favoring English clubs is that the market in Brazil and the region is now a buyer's paradise. The coronavirus pandemic has devastated the economies of teams that are allowing players to be sold in order to reduce their huge debts. Only in this way the teams from South America are equalizing the balances.
Santos, one of the continent's most successful clubs, was forced to sell talented Venezuelan player Yeferson Soteldo for a paltry five million euros to Toronto FC. Santos will only see $23 million of that fee for the 118-year-old, as the rest will go to Chile's Huachipato in order to pay off existing debts. The situation at Fluminense is even more serious. The team from Rio had nearly XNUMX million euros in debt, the third highest liability of all Serie A clubs in Brazil. Despite selling more than ten players in Europe in the last six years, including Richarlison, Fluminense still have huge debts and therefore need to continue selling players to reduce them.
Kayky will at least have next year to gain further first-team experience having started in two Copa Libertadores matches so far. In the meantime, Fluminense is already preparing the next possible star - the creator of art, who together with Kayky led the club to the title of U-17 champion. It is about midfielder Arthur, who in March became the youngest player in the history of the club to debut with the first team. Arthur was only 16 years and eight days old.
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If Arthur's development continues at this rate, then he will soon be transferred to Europe as he will attract the attention of the big clubs of this continent.
English football's elite have traditionally stayed away from South America, in most cases opting to buy after players have made a name for themselves in Europe, but that has now changed. Meanwhile, poor clubs in Brazil and elsewhere need the production of players to continue to take advantage of Europe's hungry clubs willing to pay for ready-made talent.
