{"id":16469,"date":"2025-06-30T08:15:21","date_gmt":"2025-06-30T08:15:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/arda-guler-turkish-messi-ready-to-replace-luka-modric-at-real-madrid\/"},"modified":"2025-06-30T08:15:21","modified_gmt":"2025-06-30T08:15:21","slug":"arda-guler-turkish-messi-ready-to-replace-luka-modric-at-real-madrid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/arda-guler-turkish-messi-ready-to-replace-luka-modric-at-real-madrid\/","title":{"rendered":"Arda Guler: &#8216;Turkish Messi&#8217; ready to replace Luka Modric at Real Madrid"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Wolves boss Vitor Pereira is among those convinced Guler will become a world superstar \u2013 and he knows better than most.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The Portuguese gave Guler, then just 16, his debut with Fenerbahce in 2021, and recalls he was immediately aware of the youngster&#8217;s rare ability.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He reminded me of James Rodriguez when I coached him at the age of 19, recently arrived at Porto,&#8221; Pereira told Spanish newspaper Marca last week. &#8220;They are two players with exceptional talent.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He [Guler] was a boy among men, but every time he received the ball he found the final pass. And if he made a mistake, he asked for the ball back to try again.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Pereira doesn&#8217;t believe the comparison with Messi has much merit, instead agreeing with the player himself \u2013 and apparently Alonso \u2013 that he should be given the central midfield role previously occupied by Modric.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I always saw him more as an eight or a 10 because of his ability to unbalance opposition between the lines,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He&#8217;s intelligent, he looks for solutions before he receives the ball, he can play long or short, he can make the final pass or shoot from long range.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He understands the game and always wants to know more. I can definitely see him playing instead of Modric.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">And the difficulties encountered by Guler last season have done nothing to dampen Pereira&#8217;s expectations of his former player&#8217;s potential.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Coming to Real Madrid, with so many top-quality players, isn&#8217;t easy,&#8221; he concluded. &#8220;But he&#8217;ll find his place. I have no doubt his future has big things in store. He&#8217;s got the quality and mentality to become a main protagonist.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Less than a month into Alonso&#8217;s reign, that process is already unfolding.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">And if he shines in the last-16 tie against Juventus, it would be another sign Guler is ready to take the football world by storm.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/football\/articles\/c15wnxw2ld4o\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Wolves boss Vitor Pereira is among those convinced Guler will become a world superstar \u2013 and he knows better than most. The Portuguese gave Guler, then just 16, his debut with Fenerbahce in 2021, and recalls he was immediately aware of the youngster&#8217;s rare ability. &#8220;He reminded me of James Rodriguez when I coached him [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16470,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-european-football","category-world-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16469"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16469\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16471,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16469\/revisions\/16471"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}