‘Juventus Primavera & Youth Sector’ Latest: Coppa Italia QFs, Getting to Know Carlos & Pol Garcia

In this week’s ‘Juventus Primavera & Youth Sector’ series, resident Settore Giovanile expert Adam Digby reports on the Primavera’s progress in the Coppa Italia and the Allievi’s Future Champions tournament in Brazil, before turning the spotlight on Pol & Carlos Garcia, two players who may just have big futures at the club.

Primavera

Marco Baroni‘s men continued their great form, emerging triumphant in a game in which they played well below their capabilities when Lazio visited Vinovo for the second leg of the Coppa Italia Quarter Final (the first leg had ended 2-0 in favor of Juventus).

Goals from early substitute Francesco Margiotta and Stefano Beltrame were enough to overcome not only the Biancocelesti, but also a very poor penalty miss from Juve’s Nicò Corticchia. The match was a rather tense encounter (the two coaches were sent off by the referee for a touchline dispute), without many scoring chances on either side, also due perhaps to the strong winds blowing in Turin.

With their 4-0 aggregate win, the Bianconeri move on to face Fiorentina in the next round, the very same team they are fighting for league supremacy in the Campionato ‘Group A’ standings.

Speaking of campionato, Coach Baroni clearly had one eye on Wednesday’s league encounter against Sampdoria, his Coppa line-up containing very few regular starters and a large turnover of players will come as no surprise, when that game is finally played after being cancelled last month.

Allievi Nazionali

Elsewhere the Allievi Nazionali (U-17)’s brief sojourn to Brazil for the Future Champions tournament ended at the group stage after a 1-1 draw with Boca Juniors and losses to both Atlético Mineiro (0-1) and Cruzeiro (4-2).

You can find photos of the Juventus vs. Cruzeiro match on the Future Champions Facebook page.
 

Two Kids Worth the Wait

With only the Primavera match with Sampdoria before the entire youth sector takes its Winter break, we have time to address an issue currently causing a little confusion among fans of the Bianconeri, and subject of a few questions from our readers.

The name ‘Garcia’ has become an increasingly regular sight on Baroni’s teamsheet, with both Pol and Carlos Garcia among the players currently keeping the team’s superb run going. More often than not, there has been at least one of them in the side although thankfully, for the sake of avoiding confusion, not both together! That may however, be a problem alluded to in last week’s column, as the coach has been almost obliged to regularly rotate his team due to the sheer number of quality players available to him.

Joining those two, competing for a place in central defence are Hörður Björgvin Magnússon, Prince-Désir Gouano, Gianluca Rubin and Simone Di Dio. Yet still the pair regularly win a place in the starting eleven, despite Pol being over two years younger than the other names on the list, and Carlos also being among the youngest in the group. JuventiKnows takes a closer look at the Garcia pair, which will hopefully help Juventini tell the difference between them!
 

Pol Garcia (R) in action against Corinthians at the Future Champions tournament

Pol Garcia (born February 18, 1995) is a Spanish U-17 International signed by Fabio Paratici (whose recruitment work for the Settore Giovanile has been simply brilliant over the past 18 months) in August this year. That he was previously part of the Barcelona youth set-up – he was born in Terrassa, a town in Eastern Catalonia – is huge credit to him but not a reason to get overly carried away, a fate that has befallen far too many players before him.

That said even at such a young age, Pol is emerging as a very cultured defender, as comfortable in possession of the ball as you would expect from a player of his background. While comparisons to Gerard Piqué (who also left Barca at a similarly young age) are extremely premature, it is easy to see why as they do share a number of traits.

Due to his age he has featured for both the Primavera and Allievi Nazionali team – with whom he travelled for the ‘Future Champions’ tournament last week – but is considered very much a part of Baroni’s squad. Due to an issue with the international clearance of his transfer he has only been playing official matches since mid-November but, in a number of practice games against the Senior team, he has impressed at a level way above where he should be playing. He was one of only two players (the other being Di Dio) to play 90 minutes for the B team at Juve’s traditional Summer family match at Villar Perosa.

Pol’s namesake, Carlos Garcia, is two years his senior (born January 17, 1993 in Bromma, Sweden) and joined Juventus from Djurgården in early 2010. He is another who has truly benefited from the group of players born in 1991 and 1992 all being moved on, making the most of that opportunity with six league appearances to his name this season already. He has done so while displaying a maturity beyond his years, and has the potential to mature into being a truly accomplished central defender.

Despite the fact Pol and Carlos have yet to play together, their differing attributes would make for a good blend, with the Swedish teenager a much more physical, definitely better man-marker than his Spaniard counterpart, and a real ‘stopper’-type; a stark contrast with Pol’s more libero-esque qualities. It is believed Carlos was disillusioned with his chances of first team action in Sweden and decided to take the Turin switch, as he told reporters upon agreeing the move; “I assume I’ll join the youth team there first, but my ambition is to get my debut in Serie A as soon as possible.”

While that may prove difficult, Carlos’s ambition is plain to see, as is his intelligence and patience. He came to Juve on trial earlier in 2009, as well as spending time with Inter and Tottenham, but decided to spend another few months trying to break into the Djurgården side. It was only when it became apparent that wouldn’t happen anytime soon, that the U-19 international decided to leave for greener pastures.
 

A Bright Future

The Primavera currently lead the Campionato’s Group A standings and have lost just once in the championship this season (their opening game against Fiorentina, who trail behind them at minus 2). Pol and Carlos Garcia are part of a multi-cultural squad which counts players from as many as ten different countries. Creating harmony among such a group is not an easy task but Carlos – who is currently acting as a mentor (one of a number of such arrangements) to Magnússon who arrived from Iceland in the summer – gives much of the credit to Marco Baroni and his staff:

“The new coaches hand out a lot more responsibility than the old ones did and it’s fun. It puts more pressure on our players, but that is how you grow.”

The two Garcias may be years away from the Juventus first team at just 16 and 18 respectively, but may well line up together for Baroni’s Primavera very soon. Carlos could realistically expect to move out on loan next season in order to gain some invaluable experience and, in keeping with their policy so far, create playing time in the Primavera side for those below him (such as Pol, for instance). We shall watch their careers develop and hope to see them both in Bianconeri for a long time to come.

In bocca al lupo ragazzi!