What did you do when you were 16 years old? The common denominator of the answers to this question could be going to school. It’s the same thing that does Lamine Yamal, although with a difference. The youngest footballer to play in a European Championship does so while wearing the national team shirt. Spain in the highest continental competition after a great season on a personal level with the Barcelona. The school routine is something that led to concentration and he divided his time between games, leisure and study.
A few days after turning 17 (July 13), the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) showed the intimacy of the far right in his room, while he was carrying out pending tasks as a fourth-year student of Compulsory Secondary Education (ESO), a step prior to entering Baccalaureate: “I go to class and every day they give me different homework. Sometimes they give me more to do at home, but I do it every day”.
The youth team became champion of the Spanish League with the Blaugrana in the 2022/23 season, but it was in the last one (2023/24) when he added greater continuity with a total of 7 goals and 10 assists in 50 games of the season with the team. In addition, he was champion of the Algarve International Tournament with the Spanish Under 17 in 2023, being the top scorer. He was also one of the highest scoring players in the Euro Cup of the same category held in the same year. However, those numbers do not keep him out of his obligations.
“If they see that we are in the quarterfinals or the round of 16, they don’t put many things in my mind.“, Yamal said, although he clarified that his tutor accompanies him in his teaching: “On the days of rest, when he knows that I am not doing anything, he does tell me to do this or that.” After being focused on the camera doing a series of exercises, Lamine Yamal expressed: “They are some English homework, which is reading and answering. That’s it, I’m done with this and I’m going to sleep”.
On the other hand, the attacker, who has just given an assist in the debut with a victory against Croatia, referred to his incredible present: “It is not normal to be 16 years old playing these types of games. It’s like a dream and you don’t have to think about it too much because if it doesn’t go out of your head, you have to think about football and that’s it.”
“You always dream, as a child, of playing in these competitions like the Euro Cup, the World Cup… Anything at the National Team level. “I am very happy to be able to continue adding records like this and to see if I can beat the scorer record,” he said. And he added: “Above all, you have to think that every day you can improve yourself, that you are never at your limit, and think about football and go with the people I have always gone with.”
In addition, he added how he distributes his free time on the days when there is no game Red Fury: “I always try to be with the young people playing Play, ping-pong… If I don’t watch a series in the room or the Euro Cup, which with the match schedules goes very well because in the end you are watching a match, or playing Play or with the iPad.”
In a different sense, he recounted the advice he received from Jesus Navas, a teammate who is 22 years older than him (38) and was champion of the 2010 World Cup and the 2012 Euro Cup with the national jersey: “A player who is sharing a dressing room with you and who in the end has won that is something incredible. He tells me to enjoy, that everything comes, that we are a family.”
The team led by Luis de la Fuente beat Croatia 3-0 and plays again this Thursday from 4pm against Italy with the possibility of securing qualification to the round of 16 with a win. They will close the zone this Monday against Albania starting at the same time.
