Five years ago, Vinícius Jr showed his talent to the world at only 16 years of age in Brazil, specifically at Flamengo, his youth football team since 2010, when he was only 10 years old.
There he thrived through all the youth categories until being capped for the first time in his career.
In his first professional football experience in 2017, he played around 36 matches, including 7 in the CONMEBOL Sudamericana Cup.
They reached the final but lost 2-1 against Argentinian Independiente.
Vinicius Jr took part in the final, being subbed in at the 72 minute.
He scored 4 goals and 1 assist.
One season later, his talent totally exploded in Brazil.
He played around 32 matches and scored 10 goals and 3 assists. He made his full debut at the CONMEBOL Libertadores Cup but was knocked out in the round of 16.
Vinicius Jr demonstrated to the world his ability in small spaces, his change of speed, and multiple skills, from truly incredible to very bad ones that he had to work on, like decision-making and finishing.
However, that was the most important season of Viniciuss career, as he signed the biggest contract.
The one that attached his name to Real Madrid, making him the new signing of the greatest club in the history of football.
Things started to heat up in Madrid, Spain, and all around the world, as Florentino Pérez paid up to 45 million euros for an 18-year-old Brazilian player, who, for some football fans, didnt show off anything special during his first two seasons as professional footballer.
Others wouldnt believe he would do it in Europe because his physicality and the pressure were starting to get bigger and bigger for a 176cm, skilly and pacey winger from Sao Goncalo.
Additionally, he arrived at Real Madrid in the reconstruction season after Cristiano Ronaldos sale to Juventus.
The 2018/19 campaign wasnt his best.
He played 31 matches, 18 of which were in La Liga. In his first appearances with Los Blancos, he scored 2 goals and delivered 2 assists.
It was very low numbers for a player that came with such expectations.
The press and fans started making jokes and harsh criticism of Vinicius Jr. because he was very unpredictable and challenging to beat but failed too much in his decision-making.
Nevertheless, his talent was undeniable, and two seasons later, at the end of the 2020/21 campaign, he started to develop more on his mental and technical attributes when it was time to deliver a big end product.
The 2021/22 season and the start of the present have been reminders that players can massively evolve within days, weeks, or months.
He has become one of the best players in the world, ended 8th in the 2022 Ballon dOr, and won his first UEFA Champions League and second league title, being a vital part of Carlo Ancelottis tactics.
In this data analysis piece, we will use our exclusive xGold tool to identify five similar players to Real Madrids star, Vinicius Jr, using a U23 age filter and looking only for right-wingers and left-wingers in Brazils Serie A and Serie B.
TFAs XGold is a custom-built tool that allows us to find players who perform similarly to any player in the world from a data perspective.
To visualise the data of our players for this analysis, we use statistics from Wyscout, which will be run through Python to create pizza charts that show a set of metrics we use to assess left-wingers.
The data will also be converted into percentile rankings, with each player compared to fullbacks in their own leagues.
Firstly, though, we will need to understand how Vinicius Jr has become an impressive and vital player in Real Madrids attacking system.
Vinícius Junior Scouting Report At Real Madrid & Spain
Pizza charts show three aspects of a players input to the game: in the attacking and defensive phases, and in-possession terms that get a little more deeply about passes, whether theyre progressive or dangerous ones that break lines.
As you can see, Vinicius ranks exceptionally high in every one of the attacking and in-possession aspects.
Vinícius Júniors style of play leaves him constantly in 1v1 situations or inside the box where he can finish build-ups, putting him in the
