When FIFA announced the finalists for Golden Boy 2022 — an award that distinguishes the best young football player each year — Barcelona found itself well represented. No less than five athletes trained at La Masia — Ansu Fati, Baldé, Pedri, Gavi and Nico González (currently at Manchester City) — were among the 20 names nominated by world football’s highest governing body.
Three years after that election, Ansu Fati, then one of the most promising athletes on the planet, saw his career halted by a series of injuries. Today, it is in the Principality that the winger, still 22 years old but with the maturity of someone who has already been through a lot, tries to regain the prestige he once held.
Once appointed as Lionel Messi’s successor at Barcelona — heir, even, to the maroon number 10 jersey when the Argentine moved to Paris Saint-Germain —, Fati was soon given the responsibility of being the new prince of Catalonia. At just 16 years old, the Spaniard born in Guinea-Bissau was already playing and scoring goals for Barça’s main team. In 2019, at just 17 years and 40 days old, became the youngest to score goals in the Champions Leaguea mark that not even Lamine Yamal — who years later would emerge with a similar promising status at Barça — could surpass.
In the following years, Fati began to deal with the biggest enemies of his brief career: the injuries. Meniscus, thigh, calves… physical problems occurred and the winger, little by little, lost space at Barça. With new signings and promises like Yamal emerging, he was loaned to Brighton, where he once again had to deal with injuries and even received public criticism from coach Roberto De Zerbi for his performance when he was physically fit.
Without adapting to the Premier League and equally without space in Hansi Flick’s Barcelona last season, Fati saw a new opportunity in the most recent transfer window: He was loaned to Monaco, where he has shown that there is still time to regain the shine that seemed lost.
In three matches for the Monegasque club in Ligue 1, he scored five goals, breaking a record that was not achieved in the main French league since 1948. That year, Johan Audel, then at Valenciennes, scored five times in 137 minutes of play; Fati, current top scorer in the championship, it only took 126 to reach the same mark. He also scored a goal in the Champions League, in Monaco’s defeat against Club Brugge (4-1).
The winger’s first great moment in the red and white jersey came on his debut in the French championship. On September 21, when Monaco were drawing 1-1 at home with Metz, Fati came on in the second half — launched by the now fired coach Adi Hütter — and changed the course of the game. He scored in the first minute to make it 2-1 and scored again in the 83rd minute, when the score indicated another equality. The match ended with a 5-2 victory for Monaco.
Since then, Fati has become a regular in the Monegasque team and once again caught the attention of Luis de la Fuente, the current Spanish coach. “Ansu Fati is on the list of athletes we are watching, we monitor all players who could be in the national team. He has already scored six goals this season and is on our radar. I just can’t confirm that, if someone gets injured, he will be the substitute, but it is Of course, Ansu in good form is great news for the team”, said the coach at a press conference on the eve of Spain’s match against Georgia, last Saturday (11).
Not only the national team, but also other European teams are closely following Fati’s promising start in the Principality. One of them is Barcelona itself, which, before letting the winger go on loan with an option to buy, insisted on renewing the young man’s contract until 2028.
Three years after appearing among the Golden Boy candidates, Ansu Fati sees in Monaco the opportunity to prove that he still belongs to the elite of European football’s great promises. Depending on what he shows this season, the Spaniard may even cross paths with his friends Baldé, Pedri and Gavi again — and, who knows, find the place that once seemed inevitable: that of a football star.