Not Just Ronaldo – John Guidetti, Hat-Trick King


Cristiano Ronaldo scored another hat-trick as Real Madrid brushed Levante aside with a 4-2 win, making it 27 league goals in 22 matches for him and 34 in all competitions. There’s more to life than Real, Ronaldo, Barca and Messi, and the most interesting story of a red hot striker right now is John Guidetti of Feyenoord.

The 19 year old Sweden U-21 forward actually belongs to Manchester City, but has been spending his time on loan for the last few seasons – first with his boyhood club Brommapokjarna, then Burnley and this season, finally breaking out into some sort of stardom, at least in the Netherlands, with Feyenoord.

Guidetti has been in decent form for most of the season, but has really exploded in the last few games, scoring three hat-tricks in the last four matches. Two of those 3 goal performances came against Twente and Ajax, with Vitesse being the latest victim of his insane scoring spree.

Guidetti isn’t coming out of nowhere, as you can guess, but his chances with Manchester City have been limited so far. An impressive run with the U-18 team hardly finds you a spot in Mancini’s side, and so far, Guidetti’s only competitive appearance for the club was a league cup match, in which he did notch up an assist.

The un-Swedish like name comes from his Italian grandfather. He actually did some of his growing up in Kenya, and attributes his playing time in some of the Nairobi slums to his ability and off field development. The sad thing about all this, is of course Feyenoord. After a disastrous 2010-2011 campaign, the Dutch giants are back on track, at least with a good chance to be in Europe next season, a must for a club with this kind of stature. Guidetti, if he continues to impress, might be back in England, sitting on the City bench.

Especially if Erik Hamren gets some sense and calls him up to play for the national team in the 2012 Euro. Warning though. Goals in the Eredivise tend to be an inflated statistic. Just look at another Swedish striker, Marcus Berg, who bagged plenty of them for Groningen and was decent for PSV between his rather disappointing Hamburg spells.


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