Leicester & Watford Interested in 19-Year-Old Sporting CP Winger Gonzalo Plata

​Leicester City and Watford are reportedly interested in Sporting CP's teenage winger Gonzalo Plata in the upcoming transfer window. 

Plata only joined Sporting's youth team in January 2019 from the Ecuadorian top flight but has impressed enough to earn a promotion to the senior side this season, where he has caught the eye of at least two Premier League clubs.

Gonzalo Plata

Despite making just four starts in the Portuguese top flight, Plata has appeared on the radar of both Leicester and Watford, with one goal and as many assists during his brief spell with the first team. 

According to a report in The Sun (via the ​Leicester Mercury) both the Foxes and the Hornets are keen on the 19-year-old Ecuador international despite his limited experience of elite European football.

Plata is thought to be worth a fee in the region of £20m - a figure which Watford have only ever once surpassed in their transfer history when they bought ​Liverpool's tormenter Ismaïla Sarr for £27m in 2019. 

Ismaila Sarr

Plata may have only made a handful of starts, but since the turn of the year he has been involved in nine of Sporting's ten league games yet stayed on the bench for their defeat to Braga in the semi-final of Portugal's domestic Cup. 

With Gerard Deulofeu out until at least September following a rupture to his cruciate ligament when Watford ​ended Liverpool's unbeaten run in early March, Plata could prove to be a decent understudy to the Spaniard on the flanks as he fully recovers. 

​Leicester have already parted ways with the best part of £50m for talent from Sporting CP in the form of the misfiring Islam Slimani and midfielder Adrien Silva in 2016 and 2017 respectively - both of whom are no longer at the club.


Brendan Rodgers will be hoping that, should Plata complete the move, he will have a much more successful spell in the Midlands than those to have travelled the same route in the past. 


Source : 90min