If there was any doubt about Viktor Gyokeres’ footballing credentials, they were put to bed on Tuesday (November 5).
Gyokeres was the centre-piece to a Sporting Lisbon side that picked apart Manchester City in the Champions League.
The Swede truly felt like a superstar on Tuesday evening, and it’s been a long road to the top for a man that was turning out for Coventry just a couple of years ago.
IF Brommapojkarna have hardly been heavy hitters in Sweden, in fact, back in 2016, they sunk as low as the third tier. However, they had a saviour in their ranks – a 17-year-old Gyokeres.
“When I took him to Bromma, he was 14 and the head of the academy said he wasn’t good enough,” David Eklund, academy scout at Brommapojkarna, told the BBC. “He was never a superstar like Dejan Kulusevski [another Brommapojkarna youth product]. But he scored goals. That’s it.”
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And yet, it would be Gyokeres’ goals that fired the Stockholm-based side back into the top division with back-to-back titles. His performances in Sweden attracted the attention of Brighton.
However, after turning out for Brighton’s U23 side he struggled to break into the first team – leading to a series of loans to St Pauli, Swansea and Coventry.
Brighton had lost faith in their Swedish wonderkid, and Dan Ashworth, then of Brighton, pulled the plug on the deal – allowing him to sail into the sunset on the cheap.
(Image: Greig Cowie/REX/Shutterstock)
Gyokeres hadn’t been at his best for Coventry – and there were eyebrows when he made the permanent, but something changed over that summer.
“It was almost as though you’d signed a different player,” Adi Viveash, Coventry’s assistant manager told Sky Sports. “The next season he came in with the confidence of being bought by a team, and suddenly he’d been told that he was going to be the main man. And he looked like the main man.
“He built himself up, he’d obviously worked hard in the off-season in the gym, and the contacts with his back to goal? He started smashing centre-backs around in training! And it was a real eye-opener for all of us to go: ‘OK, this lad means business now’.”
(Image: Greig Cowie/REX/Shutterstock)
On loan from Brighton, he had managed just three goals in 30 Championship games – that became 38 goals in 91 matches in the next two seasons at Coventry.
His 21 second-tier goals in the 2022/23 season not only caught the eye of Sporting – but nearly took the Sky Blues to the Premier League. Only a defeat to Luton Town in the Championship play-off final denied that reality.
Gyokeres even got a classy assist for Coventry’s equaliser at Wembley. He was now the real deal – and he would soon go stratospheric at Sporting.
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And, well, you know the story from here. Sporting’s main man whose the talk of Europe.
Gyokeres hasn’t just evolved in one of Europe’s best players in Portugal, he’s also found love with jaw-dropping actress Ines Aguiar. “I have been traveling with company,” Ines joked in an interview with Caras.
She was also asked if her heart was taken and if she was happy, to which she simply replied: “I am well.”
(Image: inesvarzeaaguiar/Instagram)
It only looks a matter of time until Gyokeres makes his next step – with Manchester United chief among those interested, while Barcelona have also emerged as viable candidates.
“Gyokeres? I’ve just made peace with them [Sporting], I’m not even going to joke about it [signing him for United],” Amorim declared. “Gyokeres is at a big club and now all he has to do is finish the season here.”
TNT Sports received further insights when Amorim remarked: “No, no no. I cannot be funny with that. In this moment it was tough for me to leave, if I am starting joking about that with your cameras I have problems.
“This is my city, this is my country so I will respect [that] Viktor has to stay until the end of the season and then his life is going, maybe, somewhere else.”