Rafael Leão reveals Benfica issues that led him to sign for Sporting | OneFootball

Before signing with Sporting, Rafael Leão had everything agreed with Benfica and now he shares what went wrong.

Rafael Leão - who recently had his celebration at Alvalade - eventually became one of the products of Sporting's youth academy, but before that, he had an 'episode' with Benfica, which ultimately led him to decide to head to the Cristiano Ronaldo Academy while still in the youth ranks.

"Benfica wanted me to sign. My father said yes, he is also a Benfica fan. I signed with Benfica, but at that time my father didn't have a car, so I had no way to get to training. Benfica said 'don't worry, sign the contract, we have a van ready to take your son from school to training'. I was waiting for that van," he began to recount on the podcast 'SayLessGlobal'.

However, the current Milan forward confirms that this never happened, which led him to join the lions: "The van never came. Second and third day, the same. A week passed, and I started to cry. I didn't even get to do a training session. That's when we decided to sign with Sporting."

Leão then admitted that this episode became a 'joke' between his father and Rui Costa recently: "A few months ago, my father was with Rui Costa, who is now the president [of Benfica], and they started laughing. 'I apologize for what happened to your son, for not picking him up...'"

Rafael Leão made his debut for Sporting's first team in the 2017/18 season, under the decision of Jorge Jesus. In that game, the now Portuguese international scored a goal in the Classic against Porto, at the Estádio do Dragão. His stay at the Alvalade Club did not end in the best way, as in the summer of 2018, he ended up unilaterally terminating his contract with the green and whites, after the attack on the Academy, signing with Lille on a free transfer.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.