Ronaldo Vieira has revealed to Football Italia that he thought his shock summer exit from Leeds United was in the club’s best interests.
The England Under-21 international was surprisingly sold by the Championship giants for a fee of around £7million two years after graduating from the academy into the first team.
Vieira made a series of revelations about his transfer to Serie A, claiming it had been on the cards for a few years and admitted it came about almost too early in his career.
“We played Atalanta two years before, I think?” Vieira told Football Italia. “I had had a good first season at Leeds, but the second didn’t go so well. But when I spoke to the [sporting] director he told me they’d had their eyes on me for a long time now.
“It came about almost too quickly for me, I just decided what was best for Leeds as a club and what was best for me, and decided to take the jump.
“Any new experience is recommended but it depends on what you want to do. It depends on whether you’re willing to take that other step to being a successful footballer. It’s not just about staying at home and being close to your family, you also have to take chances.
“It might not work out for me but it’s obviously worked out for [Borussia Dortmund’s Jadon] Sancho. I hope it does work out for me, it’s a chance you have to take in life and I am enjoying my time.”
OPINION
Vieira’s transfer to Sampdoria didn’t make sense at the time and still doesn’t, really. He was a first-team regular at United and, although his second season didn’t match his excellent first one, that is not entirely unusual for a 20-year-old still learning the ropes. Credit to the central midfielder for taking the plunge and moving overseas in what is a growing trend among young players from England, many of whom have decamped to Germany and France. But Vieira has had only 26 minutes of action for Sampdoria, remaining as an unused substitute for seven of the club’s nine matches this season. While there are no guarantees he would have been playing regularly for Leeds, especially with the Kalvin Phillips and Mateusz Klich partnership being so integral to the team’s impressive start to the campaign under Marcelo Bielsa, he would have had more than two brief cameos, that’s for sure.