Rodrigo Mora with the under-21s isn’t a demotion, quite the opposite | OneFootball

After the announcement of the National Team squad list, one of the standout names was Rodrigo Mora, who was part of the group that won the Nations League in June and who, two and a half months later, now appears in the under-21 team call-up.

Roberto Martínez believes that time is part of the natural trajectory for an 18-year-old player like Mora and recommends, above all, that the athlete gets playing time, an opportunity that the under-21s can offer him.

“He was just on the team that won the Nations League, and coach Luís Freire will talk about that. We think it’s a good training camp for Rodrigo Mora to be important and have a significant role in the under-21s. It’s not a demotion, it’s the opposite. It’s an opportunity to continue his development process,” assured the Spaniard.

Roberto Martínez chose João Félix as an example of this. “Take João Félix – 25 years old, but he has many years of experience and now he’s happy, he’s playing, that’s what’s important. I’ve said it before: it’s not the market, or a league, it’s not that. It’s a locker room, a project, it’s what the player needs to do, we’ve had many examples: the situation of Rúben Neves, even Cristiano Ronaldo’s… it’s not the league or the country,” he explains.

“I’ve said it many times, there’s no right step or wrong step. The important thing is to play, to be important in the locker room and to have challenges where the player can evolve and also grow. It’s the player’s role within the locker room that is important and difficult. It’s better to evaluate later, at the end of a season,” concluded the national coach on this topic.

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