JJ Gabriel is the crown jewel of Man Utd’s academy, and his credentials were recently boosted by Bryan Mbeumo’s comments about him.
Despite being just 15, JJ Gabriel has trained with the first team multiple times, and a debut next season is a matter of when, not if.
Gabriel has impressed in first-team training, as Bryan Mbeumo revealed recently by calling him “special”.
Those remarks were a huge endorsement in themselves, but what Man Utd U18s manager Darren Fletcher has said since then makes them age even more remarkably.
Bryan Mbeumo has been blown away by JJ Gabriel…
But how excited are you by the youngster's breakthrough at Manchester United? What are your expectations?
Darren Fletcher’s youth training admission
Fletcher’s time with the senior team didn’t go to plan, perhaps unluckily, but he has been the perfect mentor for the next generation of stars.
The U18s are on the cusp of a double and have given a good fight to Man City U18s in the league.
They have achieved all this while fielding one of the youngest squads at the U18s level, personified by none other than Gabriel.
The youngsters need to be challenged continuously, and in the absence of first-team opportunities, senior training is the next best thing.
In the latest episode of the Inside Carrington podcast, Fletcher said that even the jump up from youth training to senior training catches youngsters off guard.
He said: “You go from being the best player in the under-18s and finding things easy. Then you go and train with the first team, and you’re like, ‘Wow, I’ve got a lot to do.’
“That’s when you realize the level of the players, the intensity that they train at. So for me, very quickly, you find yourself making a mistake. You get caught on the ball. It’s quicker. Sometimes you have to humble yourself and work really, really hard to earn their respect.”
JJ Gabriel flipped the script in Man Utd training
Fletcher’s admission about the youngsters finding first-team training like a wake-up call is a natural one, which is why what Gabriel did is so remarkable.
Where do you think JJ Gabriel will be by the time he is 18?🔮
He's been playing against 18-year-olds all season, but how good will he be in three years?
He effectively flipped the script because, as Mbeumo said, Gabriel’s quality on the ball left the senior players surprised, instead of the other way around.
That is as big an endorsement as comes for a youngster, even more so when the youngster in question is just 15 years old.
If his floor is already high enough to easily slot into first-team training, then what his ceiling could eventually be is an exciting proposition.
There are a lot of unpredictable and uncontrollable factors to decide if he will get to this ceiling, but in the meantime, he’s doing all the right things.
Forget the right things, he’s flipping the script on how a youngster progresses through the ranks at the club.
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