John Guidetti

John Guidetti (Italian pronunciation: [ɡwiˈdetti]; born 15 April 1992) is a Swedish footballer, who currently plays for Manchester City.

Club career

Brommapojkarna

John Alberto Guidetti started playing in the Brommapojkarna youth system. In April 2008, at the age of fifteen he signed a three year deal with Manchester City.[1] Inter, Sampdoria, Lazio, Roma and Ajax feeder club in Capetown amongst others, had all been in competition for signing him.[2]

He enjoyed a fine season with Manchester City Under-18 team, scoring 13 times in 13 appearances. He also marked his reserve team debut with a remarkable hat-trick against a Burnley side containing several seasoned campaigners.[3] Before the start of the Swedish 2010 season Djurgårdens IF made a strong attempt at signing him on a loan deal for the whole season, but instead he ended up going on loan to his old club IF Brommapojkarna, achieving a impressive 3rd spot in Sweden attacking efficiency table scoring 3 goals and 4 assists in only 7 starts and 1 sub appearance.[1]

Manchester City's manager, Roberto Mancini, wanted to see how the youngster matched up alongside the City first team, so he was handed a chance to impress on the club's pre-season tour in the United States during the summer of 2010.[4] It was during this American tour that John played his first game for the Manchester City first team, coming on as a substitute and playing in the second half in a match against Sporting Lisbon.[5] A couple of months later John went on to make his full debut in a competitive match for the Manchester City first team when he was selected as part of the starting lineup for the League Cup third round match against West Bromwich Albion on 22 September 2010 in which he provided the assist for City's only goal in the game.[6]

On 25 November 2010 Guidetti signed an initial one month loan deal with Burnley with an option to extend the loan when it expired on 3 January 2011.[7] On 26 December 2010, in his first start for Burnley, he scored his first goal in a 2 - 1 victory at Barnsley.[8] As Manchester City would not extended the loan spell at Burnley John returned back to his parent club in early January 2011 to subsequently be added to Manchester City's registered 25-man squad for the Europa League competition.

Guidetti has played 14 matches and scored 14 goals for Sweden's various 'Under-19' national squads, including a sensational 4 goals against the Netherlands' 'Under-19' World Cup team. Although initially considered to be beyond selection to play for the Sweden U21 team (who were the leaders of their European Championship qualifying group at the time) in the June 2010 fixtures against Israel and Montenegro, Guidetti ultimately got his chance to play at this higher level as a replacement for the injured first choice striker Agon Mehmeti.[9] Guidetti accordingly took his place in the Sweden U21 team's starting eleven that won 1–0 against Israel.[10] John earnt his next international cap when he was included in the Sweden U19 team rather than the Sweden U21 team because according to Swedish 'Under-21' national team coach, Jörgen Lennartsson, they had even "greater need" for him back in that team, although he might very well feature in the Sweden U21 squad again in the near future.[11] John scored after only 4 minutes in his first game back with the 'Under-19' line-up against Poland.[12][13]After the Sweden U21 team suffered a surprise home defeat against Israel, John was recalled once again to play for this team in its decisive qualifying match against Bulgaria, where he created the winning and only goal in Sweden’s 1–0 victory.

John Guidetti’s paternal grandfather came from Italy and his mother has Brazilian roots. Guidetti has lived twice in Kenya when his father, Mike, worked with a Swedish school project inNairobi. Guidetti credits his playing football with older kids from the poorer slum areas of Kibera and Mathare Nairobi as an important step in his development as a footballer.