The numbers alone are scary.
Victor Gyokeres has made 25 appearances for club and country so far in 2024-25. He scored 33 goals.
He was the top scorer in the Portuguese top-flight for Sporting CP last season with 29 goals (eight more than anyone else). He has already scored 16 goals in the league this season (eight more than anyone else) and has failed to score in just six of his 25 games in all competitions.
He scored nine goals for Sweden in the recent Nations League group stage. He has scored 67 goals in 69 games for Sporting since joining for a bargain price of 17 million pounds ($21.4 million) from Coventry City.
The 26-year-old is entering his prime and will likely be one of the hottest players in European football in the coming months.
Oh, and to prove he doesn’t only score in leagues weaker than Europe’s top leagues, he also scored a Champions League hat-trick against Manchester City last week.
These are not bad results for a player who was in the second division of English soccer just 18 months ago.
(Gualter Fatia/Getty Images)
What is behind Kyokeresu’s rapid rise to prominence? And is this form temporary or permanent?
athletic We spoke to key figures from Gyokeres’ three clubs ahead of his move to Lisbon to find out if his incredible goal-scoring exploits were inevitable.
Speaking of eye-popping numbers, no fewer than eight members of the most recent Swedish squad have either come through the IF Brommapojkarna (translation: Bromma boys) academy in Stockholm or have played for the club at some point in their careers.
Better known as BP, he made his first-team debut for Gyokeres in 2015 at the age of 16. This is not unusual for a club that prides itself on promoting young players, including Dejan, who is currently one of Europe’s other form players. The same goes for Kulusevski and his young Tottenham Hotspur team-mate Lucas Bergvall.
BP is quite unique in its approach. Their first team has moved up and down the divisions and is currently top of the table, finishing 10th out of 16 this season. Former Aston Villa defender Olof Mellberg will complete his second term as manager and join MLS side St. Louis when his contract expires on December 1. He will coach at St. Louis City FC.
But BP is a club better known for the talent they produce than for the trophies they win. They essentially have more players than fans, 4,000 spread across youth and grassroots levels (average home attendance is around 2,000).
The academy is well-structured and well-known for its youth development culture and possession-based, high-pressing football ideology.
Kyokere stood out from a very young age. Naturally, considering his career so far, it was his ruthlessness in front of goal that was more important than anything else.
“It wouldn’t matter if he had a broken leg as long as he had a chance to score. necessary It’s about scoring goals.” says Peter Kisfaludy, who currently works for Swedish top team Djurgarden and has held a variety of roles at BP, including academy director.
“Gyokeres wants to go straight to the goal. He is powerful and gives 100% of his abilities inside the box. If you try to kick the ball, he can move his head to get the ball back. He is fearless and completely ruthless.
“He’s grown a lot, but he didn’t have the skills for it in the beginning. He was always so physical. He was strong and fast, which allowed him to play adult football from an early age.
“It’s his winning mentality. He went on loan to St. Pauli in Germany, and while he was there we spoke on the phone and I remember him saying, ‘I’m so lonely, but this will make me much stronger.’
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“The good thing about Victor is that he can score in many different ways. He is a box player, but he is fast and strong so he can also get forward with the ball.”
The road to the summit of Gyokeresu was not so smooth. BP’s current Academy Director Andreas Engelmark, who has been at the club for several years, added:
“I remember telling him one time, ‘If you want to be a professional athlete, you can’t do it like this.’ He didn’t behave well, but it wasn’t all that bad. He said, ‘I have no intention of becoming a professional player.’
“So I said, ‘Okay, I won’t force you.’ Of course he really wanted me to, but this was his mentality when he was younger. He might be a little grumpy.
“He then joined the club permanently at the age of 15 and worked hard. He’s a great kid, positive, hard working, has great confidence and the physicality you see now he’s had since he was little.
“Physicality, directness to go for the goal and finish. It’s the same thing you see now. “He scored a lot of goals.”
BP’s 25 goals in 67 first-team games pale in comparison to his current numbers at Sporting, but Gyoceres was a rough diamond in need of polish. But the potential was clear.
His last act at BP? He scored a hat-trick on the last day of the season, helping the club get promoted to the top tier.
Brighton rarely make mistakes when assessing the potential of young talent.
Like BP, they are Europe’s leading light in terms of taking raw, talented players and making them sound, albeit on a much bigger stage in the Premier League.
Moises Caicedo, Ben White, Yves Bissouma, Evan Ferguson, Alexis Mac Allister, the list is extensive. And Gyokeres is up there in that he is a player that Brighton have discovered, signed and developed. However, he left the club without making any league appearances.
Looking at their record, it’s hard to believe that a player released by Brighton is now one of the most notable players in European football a few years later.
“Players develop at different rates,” says Paul Barber, the club’s long-time CEO. athletic. “Sometimes the path inevitably gets blocked, so a loan or permanent transfer is a better option, especially if the player really wants to settle down more quickly.”
Gyokeres was 19-years-old when he moved to England’s south coast in January 2018, initially playing for Brighton’s under-23 side before making odd appearances in domestic cup competitions.
He made his debut against Southampton in the EFL Cup in August of the same year, made several appearances in the FA Cup, scored against Portsmouth in the 2020 EFL Cup, and had loan spells at St Pauli, Swansea and Coventry.
(Glyn Kirk/PA Image credit: Getty Images)
This loan spell wasn’t very effective in terms of goals (he didn’t feature in any of Swansea’s 11 Championship games, mostly as a substitute), and with his first-team opportunities limited at Brighton, the decision was made to move him on.
Physically, Gyokeres was ready, but technically he still needed some work. Graham Potter was head coach at the time and wanted a number nine who could drop deeper and link play.
For the U-21s, Aaron Connolly was used as a centre-forward, while for the Brighton first team, senior strikers Danny Welbeck and Neil Maupay blocked Gyocerres’ path and Ferguson began to break through, as Gyoceres played a lot of minutes. It means. Played on the wing at Brighton. It didn’t work out.
“When Viktor moved to Coventry in 2021, his path from here was unclear and with his contract expiring he wanted a permanent home,” explains Barber. “We have to accept the decision to sell it as is. It’s the right thing to do for the player and the club.
“What Victor has achieved is fantastic. Everyone is happy for him. He is a great young man and has become a fantastic player. I wish him good luck. Recruiting players is not an exact science, and neither are the decisions or timing of player moves.
“You may be able to look back on your decisions in hindsight, but there is always a reason for a decision. It’s about making a series of judgments in real time. Most clubs have similar examples. It’s soccer. That happens.”
Gyokeresu ran away.
Gyokeres never got that opportunity at Brighton. But I think it was like that. because He was given the opportunity to become a leading striker in a Championship team at Coventry and he succeeded.
The Swede performed well for the Sky Blues during his loan spell in the second half of 2020-21, scoring three goals and showing some potential in appearances that mostly came from the bench.
But it was only when Coventry signed him permanently for around £1m in the summer of 2021 that 23-year-old Gyokeres began to grow into the responsibility given to him by manager Mark Robins and his assistant Adrian Viveash.
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Viveash remembers seeing a noticeable change in Gyokeres that summer. He enjoyed the most prolific period of his career, scoring nine goals in 11 Championship games.
“He came back on the first day of pre-season and all the coaches and Dennis Lawrence (first-team coach) could see the difference in him,” Viveash told The Athletic FC podcast. “He just looked like a different person. The confident Bag clearly hinted that he will be a leading player for the club and will feature in nine games.
“He has gained belief in himself and is just starting to threaten Championship defences. And over the next two years he got better and better.
“He worked very hard. If you defend on the halfway line against a player like Vick, he will keep running at you from behind. He might miss a chance or two, but he’ll make it 13, 14, or 15 times. And for defenders it is very difficult to deal with. That’s why power and explosive pace stood out,” he said.
Coventry spent time studying Gyokeres’ abilities, not only scoring goals from tighter areas, but also moving across defenders and finishing early. He scored 38 goals in 91 league appearances for Coventry before moving to Sporting in 2023.
His unwavering and stubborn attitude was what ultimately helped Gyokeres achieve success at senior level, but he may have been a bit of a late developer in terms of how he took his coach’s instructions.
“He was a really interesting character to work with because he was very driven,” adds Viveash. “Obviously I’m a passionate coach. I’ve been fortunate enough to work with some of the best players. He will say: ‘Well, I’m better than them.’ So over time we joked around a bit, but it was a very chatty relationship between coach and player. The confidence was always there.
“That run-in power is definitely geared towards Premier League football, goal returns and other things.
“I’m sure he still has to keep improving because he’s up against bigger and stronger centre-backs in Europe and the Premier League.
“He is a really nice, humble and very hard-working boy. “Everyone is different, so it’s a really cool story to see someone develop in a different way a little later in life.”
As at Coventry, all Gyokeres needed to continue his development was regular top 11 football from Sporting.
Stating that Gyokeres’ father Stefan plays an important role in leading and shaping his son’s career, Viveash believes that Gyokeres can achieve the best of his abilities whether he can succeed in a division like the Premier League or not. We’ll get another glimpse of the match against Arsenal in the Champions League on Tuesday night.
(PATRICIA DE MELO MOREIRA/AFP, courtesy of Getty Images)
“This was a great choice for him and Sporting,” he added.
“He’s not a natural closer to me. I have worked with several people who are very natural, and he is not. So it’s a thank you and credit to him for improving that area of his game and certainly achieving the numbers that he’s achieved.
“If he comes up against a physical specimen like William Saliba and Gabriel, who is as good as anyone in world football right now, you would think that could be a positive or a negative to the argument.
“He was one of those guys who deserved the opportunity and if it (a Premier League move) comes in the future, he will definitely give it everything he’s got, that’s for sure.”
(Additional reporting by Andy Naylor)
(Bernardo Benjamim ATP Images/Getty Images)
