Mightily impressed: Enzo Maresca
Chelsea Football Newsletter
Enzo Maresca admitted he can see why Chelsea’s teen sensation Estevao Willian was valued by experts this week at more than £100million.
The football research experts CIES published a report this week that showed their formula valuing players had 18-year-old Estevao at £103.8m.
According to their formula, he is the second-most valuable teenager in world football, behind only Barcelona and Spain star Lamine Yamal, whose value they estimated at £307.4m.
Estevao has scored four goals in his last eight appearances for Chelsea and quicky become a fans’ favourite at Stamford Bridge.
He assisted Joao Pedro for Chelsea’s second goal in Saturday evening’s 3-0 Premier League win over Wolves just a minute after being introduced from the substitutes’ bench.
Reminded of the report that valued Estevao at more than £100m, Maresca said: “You can see that, absolutely. He is top, his talent.
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“We are trying to help him to adapt and to give him the right minutes. He is doing fantastically. For this club in the next five to ten years, I think he will be a top, top player.”
While he is trying to manage Estevao’s minutes — he has not started in the Premier League since September — Maresca did accept that it is impossible to dampen down Chelsea fans’ excitement and the building expectation around Estevao’s impact at such a young age.
“Absolutely, yes,” he said. “I have said already that the reason why fans pay for their tickets is because they want to see players like Estevao, like Cole [Palmer]. People are happy when they are on the pitch.
“The only difference is that Estevao arrived from Brazil [and] needs a little bit to adapt. Slowly, slowly, for sure, he’s going to start games for us in the future.”