Benfica Complete Balboa Deal

Balboa joins benfica

 News

The 23-year-old has agreed to join the Portuguese outfit on a four-year contract and is expected to be formally announced by the club still today.

Balboa found playing time extremely limited at Real Madrid and is hoping this new challenge will reignite his career.

The Equatorial Guinea international will be brought into the team to play as a right-sided winger, a position filled last season by Maxi Pereira without much success.

Although Balboa’s asking price is set at €6 million, it is believed that Real Madrid have accepted a lower fee to secure a buy-back clause attached to his contract.

The ex-Racing Santander player has now become Benfica’s third signing of the summer after Ruben Amorim and Hassan Yebda.

My Thoughts

 I have not seen a lot of this guy but when I first saw him as a sub, in the Galactico Era when there were many Real Madrid players injured,  I think Luxembergo was the coach then or may be Lopez Caro, the coach used him only as an emergency player and Balboa was never a first team player or even a first team sub. He came straight from the youth teams and looked like a natural pure winger, with a lot of pace and crossing ability.

Balboa was a speedy winger but nothing special

After that he had very little appearences for Real Madrid and was not even used as a sub, he came on in the Champions League match of Real Madrid vs Olympaikos in 2007-2008 season. Scored a goal right at the end to give Real Madrid a win 4-2 at the final whistle.

His goal was not actually his own goal. Robinho got the ball a little outside the Real Madrid box, and hit Olympaikos on the break, Robinho went past 3 players and in the end passed the ball to Javier Balboa who was lining up for the shot and he just stroked the ball past the keeper for a nice finish.

Good thing is that Real Madrid though has sold him for less, has included a buy back clause which will be very useful for the future. If Javier Balboa gets first team action with Benfica and he turns out to be another C.Ronaldo then Real Madrid can and I think will buy him back.

Personally I doubt if he has the quality to be the best or even among the best in the world so I think a good deal done by Real Madrid, selling Balboa at this time was perfect as he is till young and Real Madrid has got a pretty good price for him. Had he stayed at Real Madrid for another season, Real Madrid would have had to sell him for like 1 million or something.

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