There is an unavoidable irony in Manchester City being sent packing from the Club World Cup by a striker who, once on West Ham United’s radar, some felt was the second coming of Sergio Aguero himself.
As South American expert Tim Vickery explained back in 2023, shortly after those West Ham United links emerged, Marcos Leonardo had shades of a young Aguero.
“He is not particularly tall,” Vickery said of a diminutive, 5ft 9ins poacher making quite the name for himself with Corinthians at the time. “But he comes alive in the penalty box.”
Unfortunately for Pep Guardiola, while Marcos Leonardo ‘came alive’ on a thrilling Monday evening in Florida, his Man City defenders fell asleep. After two previous Al-Hilal attempts had been blocked, Leonardo drifted into space around the penalty spot and gratefully headed a looping ball past a sprawling Ederson.
And while the City supporters may bemoan the scrappy nature of Al-Hilal’s eventual winner with 112 minutes on the clock, the very best centre-forwards tend to make their own luck.
Marcos Leonardo certainly did that.
Marcos Leonardo celebrates during Manchester City v Al Hilal - 2025 FIFA Club World Cup
Photo by Waleed Zein/Anadolu via Getty Images
West Ham United once wanted Al-Hilal’s Club World Cup hero Marcos Leonardo
As Ederson parried a thumping Sergej Milinkovic-Savic header, the £34 million signing from Benfica bundled it over the line.
Two finishes which earn very few points for aesthetics. But, while taking his tally for the season to 28, belatedly brings Marcos Leonardo to wider European attention after prolific spells across the Atlantic and over in the Middle East.
“We climbed Everest with no oxygen, we did it,” a beaming Simone Inzaghi told reporters, albeit Al-Hilal’s ‘underdog’ narrative tends to fall apart when you consider this is a team also boasting Milinkovic-Savic, Malcom, Ruben Neves, Kalidou Koulibaly, Joao Cancelo and Aleksandr Mitrovic.
MORE WEST HAM STORIES
“The secret behind this victory was the players and the heart they had on the pitch,” the former Inter Milan boss adds. “We knew that we would have to do something extraordinary against a team like Manchester City.
“We were exceptional in everything. In possession, in the defensive phases, in the tactical management. It wasn’t easy against an aggressive team like City.”
While much has been made of their often-flawed approach to signing centre-forwards – Niclas Fullkrug the latest who appears ill-suited to the demands of the Premier League – West Ham were ahead of the curve when it came to Marcos Leonardo.
West Ham lost out to Benfica in £15 million deal back in 2023
As football correspondent Graeme Bailey explained, West Ham showed ‘serious’ interest in Leonardo a couple of summers back. The Londoners wanted the then-Corinthians youngster on loan, with a purchase clause included in his contract.
Leonardo would instead take a path worn down by countless other South American starlets. Shortly afterwards, the considerable financial muscle of the Middle East saw Benfica make a £20 million profit before he had even broke double figures on Lisbon soil.
Marcos Leonardo was labelled the ‘new Neymar’ by some, South America’s next Sergio Aguero by others.
Now dumping out the club with whom Aguero scribed his name into the English football history books, a still-only 22-year-old Marcos Leonardo showcased the fearsome predatory instincts which could yet earn him another stab at European football somewhere down the line.
But as West Ham scour the globe for an affordable centre-forward capable of the same dead-eyed finishing, Marcos Leonardo feels very much like a £35 million ship has long since sailed.