Viktor Gyokeres is the Swedish striker whose explosive goal-scoring has made him one of the hottest properties in Europe and could see him become soccer's next $100 million-plus player.
Yet Premier League clubs seemingly missed his rare talent when it was right under their noses.
Instead, Sporting Lisbon took a chance on Gyokeres and now stands to make a fortune after plucking him from the second tier of English soccer last year.
“He is ready for something bigger,” Sweden coach Jon Dahl Tomasson told broadcaster Viaplay ahead of Gyokeres' hat trick against Manchester City in the Champions League last week. “Everybody likes a goalscorer.”
Sporting bought Gyokeres from Coventry City for around $25 million. He has gone on to score 66 goals in 68 appearances — including 23 goals in 18 this term — and helped Sporting win the Portuguese title last season.
To put the 26-year-old forward's club statistics into context, this season he is outscoring Robert Lewandowski (19 in 17 games), Harry Kane (17 in 16) and Erling Haaland (15 in 16).
Gyokeres stretches defenses with his direct runs and is deadly in front of goal with rasping shots that find the corner of the net with unerring precision.
His impressive numbers have sparked speculation he will soon be on the move again — maybe during the January transfer window — with clubs like Manchester United, City, Arsenal, Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain all reportedly interested. Gyokeres' contract has a release clause of 100 million euros ($105.4 million).
Links to United and City are understandable. Gyokeres' former coach at Lisbon, Ruben Amorim, has just taken over at United. Hugo Viana, Lisbon's outgoing sporting director who signed him from Coventry, is on his way to City.
Gyokeres deflects comparisons to past Sporting greats Cristiano Ronaldo and Luis Figo.
“I try not to compare myself to them. I just want to be myself and do my best every day when I go to training and when we play,” he told UEFA.
A move to one of Europe's leading teams feels inevitable. The surprise is that it has taken so long for his talent to be more widely recognized.
Dalibor Savic coached Gyokeres at youth level for Brommapojkarna, a Swedish club with a reputation for developing some of the country's best emerging players.
“He was a late developer because he was not the best striker or the best player in Brommapojkarna at age 16, 17, 18, 19. We had better players in the academy and so on,” Savic, who was head coach of the club's under 19 and U21 teams, told The Associated Press. ”He made the right pathways through his career, but only he can do that because he’s so determined and focused and hard working and stubborn.
“If he if he aims at something, he will achieve it.”
Gyokeres' first chance in England came in 2018 when he joined Brighton — a team that specializes in developing players and then selling them on for huge profit.
Not on this occasion.
“Why has Viktor Gyokeres excelled after Brighton sold him?” read a recent headline on The Argus, the city's local newspaper.
It is a fair question. Brighton turned big profits on players like Moises Caiceido, Alexis Mac Allister and Marc Cucurella.
Yet Gyokeres was loaned first to St Pauli in Germany, then Swansea and finally Coventry, where he sealed a permanent move for around $1 million in 2021.
His numbers at Brighton and during his loan spells didn't point to the heights he has gone on to achieve, with seven goals in 28 games for St Pauli his best return.
“He needs to play under a certain system... he’s a power forward, he’s a deep running striker, so he’s good on transitions,” Savic said.
Despite scoring only three goals in 19 appearances on loan for Coventry, then manager Mark Robins was convinced about his quality.
“I remember saying when we first signed him that he’s in a rush, and that was how it appeared. He was looking to try to move as high as he possibly could do as quickly as he possibly could do," Robins told the Coventry Telegraph this month.
Gyokeres went on to score 40 goals in 97 games and take Coventry to the brink of promotion to the Premier League, before it eventually lost a playoff final.
That paved the way for his move to Lisbon where his performances have been impossible to ignore.
“He made the right choice going to Portugal,” Savic said. “I don’t think it's wrong to be the king of Portugal and score like 35-40 goals per year and be able to play in the Champions League every year and win the title.”
Proving he can score consistently at an even higher level will be the next challenge if Gyokeres follows in the footsteps of other top Swedish strikers like Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Henrik Larsson and moves to one of Europe's leading clubs.
Gyokeres has scored four goals in Sweden's four Nations League games since September. Sweden leads its group and hosts Slovakia on Saturday night.
“There’s no doubt that that Viktor is a top, top player, a top European player, but is he a world class player? I don’t know,” Savic said. “I would be happy to see him prove me wrong... make my question mark into an exclamation mark. Like, ‘yes — he’s a world class player.’"
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James Robson is at https://twitter.com/jamesalanrobson
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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
James Robson, The Associated Press
