The last part of the puzzle: the connection between Pep and Holland ignites the imagination

Manchester City, a team on the verge of perfection, put its hand on the player it lacked to become the top team of world football.

For the things that make the Norwegian striker so perfect for Pep Guardiola, and for the meticulous moves in his career - planned for this moment

Inbal Manor

11/05/2022

Wednesday, May 11, 2022, 6 p.m.

• Share on Facebook

• Share on WhatsApp

• Share on Twitter

• Share on Email

• Share on general

• Comments

  Comments

Summary: Manchester City - Newcastle 0: 5 (Sport 1)

August 2021. A few days before the transfer window closed, Manchester City executives gathered in a room at meetings in the complex to sum up the summer.

They discussed the huge signing of Jack Grillish and also a deal that did not materialize - that of Harry Kane.

City wanted a striker from the top of the world already at the beginning of the season, Kane wanted to move to a winning team and he did everything to make it happen.

It did not happen.

Just before everyone left the room, Chairman Khaldun threw Mubarak two words into the air: Arling Holland. The Norwegian signing campaign kicked off at that moment.

Manchester City, a team on the verge of perfection, put their hand on the player they were missing.

Manchester City got their hands on one of the next two superstars in world football the day after Messi and Cristiano.

Manchester City have won a stubborn and difficult battle no less than the championship battle against Liverpool.

The move of the Netherlands is no less great than the move of Cristiano to Madrid at the time or of Neymar to Paris.

The connection of the Norwegian goal monster with Pep Guardiola's football ignites the imagination.

As of May 2022, City have become - on paper of course - the top team of world football and that is regardless of what happened to them in Madrid last week.

Such a move would elicit a response.

Expect a hot summer.

More on Walla!

sport

Manchester City have announced that they have reached an agreement on the acquisition of Arling Holland

To the full article

One of the next two superstars in world football the day after Messi and Cristiano.

The Netherlands (Photo: Reuters)

Arling Holland does not even look human.

A combination of an alien and a robot.

Muscle monster.

A machine of exiles.

A scary athlete.

Sometimes it feels like it was engineered in a lab.

Innovative technological development.

The best minds in the world sat together, wrote codes, did experiments and produced a perfect pioneer.

His career path has also been carefully planned.

step by step.

Right on the surgical border.

Patiently and without jumping too high.

There are too many stories about talents about being missed at a young age.

The model that built Arling Holland will still be learned and emulated.

The model named after Mino Raiola, peace be upon him.

Let's go back.

In the summer of 2003, two years after Roy Keane's targeted assassination, Father Alfei Holland retired from football and returned with his family to Brin, Norway - the region where he was born and raised.

A coastal town in the southwest of the country.

12 thousand inhabitants.

One mega star.

"He was five-and-a-half when I first met him. An ordinary boy who was easy to love," said Alef Ingba Brenzen, the coach who raised the Netherlands in Brin.

"We all knew his dad, of course."

In Norway, it is customary for volunteer parents to take part in the training of children's groups.

When you have a father playing for a national team with a glorious past in the Premier League, you want to help him, but Brenzen stressed: "Alfie did not intervene and never pressured us to work a certain way."

Holland's athletic abilities stood out at a very young age.

Numbers that to this day he holds a national record in the long jump for children up to the age of five.

He was fast and excelled even when playing handball for fun or playing soccer in the halls.

There, Brenzen argues, Holland acquired "street football" skills.

The Netherlands played 11 years in Brin.

In the children's groups he scored in front of sturdy brakes and abused fast defenders.

"His wisdom in the open was the most special thing about him. He was very fast and incredibly agile, but most of all, he used his brain."

Brenzen realized he had a diamond in his hand.

"It happened earlier than I expected, when he was 11 or 12, but even then we believed he would be really good. Arling always scored goals and even when we put him in front of better opponents, he kept scoring. It repeated itself from the first moment."

Holland was simply too good for his peers.

"In five-on-five games, his team would have won 0: 7 or 0: 8 and if he had moved to the other team, they would have won 0: 7 or 0: 8. He was just a lot more than the others. So, we sent him to train with the seniors. "He lacked competition."

His athletic abilities stood out at a very young age.

Netherlands in Norway (Photo: Reuters)

More on Walla!

• The Netherlands will earn like de Brauna: "will make City the perfect team"

• Rock artist: Marcello Brozovic wants to win the trophy with Inter

• Araujo was released from the hospital after being hit in the head and losing consciousness

• Loan on better terms from the bank: up to NIS 100,000 and for any purpose

The relative problem for him at a young age was physicality.

Holland was a skinny boy.

Brenzen and Brin's people did not think he was physically developed to play with the alumni, but believed it was the right step in his development.

The Netherlands played 16 games and did not score.

This did not prevent him from moving to the homeland.

All the big clubs in Norway have followed him for over two years.

Molde won.

When he arrived they sent him with a neat plan to the gym and waited patiently.

In a short period of time he gained 15 kg in muscle mass.

What is special about Arling Holland's success story is his ability and that of those around him to deal with the difficulties.

At a very young age, every man and woman in Brin knew that a star was growing here.

His dad's identity only added to the hype.

Such expectations can also crush a player, but Arling has been kept.

Carefully plan each step.

Not stressed even when things took some time.

Molde, for example, knew she was getting an actor to work on, but also one whose head was in the right place.

"He did every action without worrying about negative consequences. It did not cross his mind," said general manager Austin Nyrland.

Wait patiently for it to explode.

It happened in a dream 17 minutes in the top game against Bran Bergen in July 2018. He scored the first in the fourth minute and by the 21st minute completed a quartet.

A week later he added a double at 1: 5 over Verlanga.

Half a year later he was already a Salzburg player.

Molde bought for £ 100,000, sold for £ 7million and has since earned two more solidarity fees in no small sums. "We always knew the deal would turn out to be good, but it was even better than we thought," Nyrland concluded.

Holland could easily have moved to Germany or England earlier.

Hoffenheim was interested, Everton tried, Leeds were very close to signing the player who was born in the city, but thousands of Raiola were looking for proven jumping clubs.

Molde, Salzburg, Dortmund.

All of these transitions happened with the next transition in mind.

Planning and accuracy some would say border on cynicism.

The father and agent directed the child to the top of the continent, with each stop along the way coming to play a temporary role in development.

You could call it the food chain in the business world of football.

Intermediate clubs prepare players for luxury clubs.

You can also feel sourness in your mouth.

Wave of use and throw.

Still, the transitions are engineered on the mechanical frontier, but the talent is pure.

The deals are designed to maximize the potential.

Pushed towards Real Madrid, his death caused a change of direction.

Raiola (Photo: GettyImages)

"Arling was very focused from the first moment, but needed a few weeks to adapt. The first half year was not easy for him," said Marco Rosa, who previously coached the striker in Salzburg and is coaching him in Dortmund this season.

Holland waited patiently and then exploded with 16 goals in half a season and nothing stopped him anymore.

Neither does the corona.

The next move happened within one year - and again Dortmund were selected due to their proven experience in promoting youngsters.

Raiola and Alfie took care to introduce a low-release clause in today's terms - 75 million euros.

Holland came to Dortmund for a limited time to move on.

Everyone knew it.

Not everyone liked it.

In Dortmund he did not need time.

In his debut he came in as a substitute and scored a hat-trick in 3: 5 over Augsburg.

In total he scored 85 goals in 88 games in all competitions.

A league goal every 87 minutes, an even better balance than Robert Lewandowski.

But there were also problems.

Injuries that caused him to miss a double-digit number of games this season and last season, and also the fact that with the exception of the German Cup last year, the Netherlands did not lead Dortmund to any significant title.

His period was short, personally successful, but left a mark on the history of the club.

Since he arrived, everyone has been asking when and where he will be sold.

Dortmund, as mentioned, entered into the deal when it knowingly understands that it has no say in the future.

She literally sat and waited for the release clause to be activated.

Its executives sat on the sidelines and bit their lips during the media travels of Raiola and Alfie across the continent.

There have been meetings with Real Madrid, Barcelona, ​​Chelsea, Manchester United and even Bayern Munich.

Constant news about the next station.

Week after week.

Window after window.

On the field, Arling, when he was healthy, scored and smiled his childish smile.

Everyone tried to separate the pro from the entourage that runs his business behind the scenes.

It did not always work.

"It does not affect me because I can not prevent thousands of Holland and Mino Raiola from traveling the world," then-coach then-coach Edin Terezic said last season.

"It depends on them. They are older people and they can decide what and when they want to do."

On the other hand, former actor Didi Haman spoke sharply and called the two "disrespectful."

This season, tensions have risen to new heights.

Holland admitted in January that Dortmund are pressuring him to announce what will happen in the summer.

On the grass, the team failed on all fronts as the Norwegian himself sat for long weeks in the stands.

He does not always look like the naughty and smiling boy who just enjoys scoring goals.

On Saturday, April 30, at the time of the official announcement of Raiola's death, Holland scored a hat-trick for the Bochum network only to see the visitors score twice in the final minutes and win the derby 3: 4.

It is said that during the months of Raiola's hospitalization in Milan, City officials made a pilgrimage to him to close the deal.

In Spain, it is claimed that the super agent pushed in the direction of Real Madrid and his death caused a change of direction.

What is the truth?

One thing is for sure.

To seal the Netherlands, those interested did not have to go through Dortmund but through the duo Alfie and Raiola.

The deal is worth about 350 million euros, of which about 80 million are commissions to Raiola's agency and to Alfie himself.

"The best striker in the world without a shadow of a doubt" (Photo: GettyImages, Pool)

The personal terms were agreed upon a month ago and Arling himself gave his consent to the move.

With all due respect to the business involvement in managing his career, the last word was his.

"Arling thinks for himself," Brenzen claims.

"But if you look at his development, it's clear that every transfer was very calculated."

City won the battle for the future player.

Such a deal usually elicits a chain reaction.

Expect a response.

Mariel Madrid.

From Barcelona.

From the rest of the senior English.

The upcoming transfer window is going to stand in the way of the Holland deal.

"He's the best striker in the world without a shadow of a doubt. What he does is just ridiculous," Paul Scholes said of him this summer.

"If you sign him now, you'll get 10 good years from him. Harry Kane? He's in the pick now, but he has two or three years left in the top. If you look to the future, the choice must be Holland."

Alan Shearer believes that a world-class striker is exactly what will make the difference between a powerful City and a city that will rule the continent.

"If you put a player like him in Manchester City, in the way that team produces situations, he will score 40 goals a season. City flourishes without a striker, but with a striker, it will be almost perfect. What a world-class striker can give. In the Cup semi-final, City missed twice in one-on-one situations and a similar story happened in a rematch against Real Madrid.

"City presses high and snatches balls.

The Netherlands will get a lot of opportunities in the Valley.

With his pace, his clever way of overcoming defenders and the ability to finish, I see a lot of goals.

His suffix is ​​great of course, but for me the best thing about him is the movement that allows him to create spaces for himself.

When you are static, it's easy to maintain.

You will not see him go through two or three dribbles, he always thinks where the terrain is and where he needs to run. "

• sport

• World football

• English League

Tags

• Arling Holland

• Manchester city