Santiago Munoz scores for Mexico and puts them on brink of Maurice Revello semis | OneFootball

Santiago Munoz flew into Madrid on 4 September 2021 and after 10 days quarantine was then able to travel to Tyneside.

The 19 year old Munoz had also been waiting for his work permit to be authorised before starting his 18 months loan period with Newcastle United.

On completing the agreement to sign for Newcastle, before joining up with the Under 23 set-up Santiago Munoz said: “I have to do my thing, trust me and my process has been fast. It’s 18 months but I’m going to enjoy it. This is a dream that I know is possible. I’m not under pressure, I have a different mentality, I’m calm. I have talked with people from Newcastle but this is not a pretext for not fighting for a place in the first team.”

The similarity in name to the Santiago Munez character in the film ‘Goal’ gave the loan deal for the Mexican attacking player a lot of extra publicity.

Injuries though have severely impacted the 19 year old’s time so far at Newcastle United and it was five months after arriving on Tyneside that Santiago Munoz was finally able to play for the NUFC Under 23s.

The loan signing ended up starting five second string league matches towards the back end of last season, including scoring in a dramatic 4-3 victory over the West Brom Under 23s.

A nice coincidence was that this was one of the few matches the Newcastle United Under 23s played last season at the main stadium, so Santiago Munoz scoring in his first game at St James Park.

With injuries meaning so little football last season, it has been a big bonus for the NUFC loan signing, that the Maurice Revello tournament has followed on from club football.

This tournament is being held in France and Santiago Munoz taking part with the Mexico Under 20 team.

There are 12 countries split into three groups of four, with the top team from each and the best runners-up going through to the semi-finals.

Santiago Munoz has started up front in all three group games, helping them to beat Ghana 1-0, then unlucky to lose 2-1 to Venezuela.

On Sunday it was the final group game and Mexico needed to win to stand a chance of going through to the last four and it was the Newcastle United teenager who got the key goal, putting his team ahead with a penalty (after Munoz himself was fouled in the box) in the 39th minute against Indonesia. Ruvalcaba scoring a second to make sure in the first minute of added time.

Venezuela have topped Group B, with Mexico and Santiago Munoz runners -up.

On Saturday it was Group A that was concluded, Hugo Ekitike helping France Under 20s to a 6-2 win over Argentina. France topped that group and Argentina were runners-up, with the same number of points (six) but worse goal difference than Mexico.

Group C concludes today with Colombia, Japan and Comoros all on four points and Mexico relying on results there to help them finish as best runners-up.

If qualifying, Munoz and Mexico would have a semi-final on Thursday (9 June), before potentially then the final on Sunday (12 June).