Season › 2015-16 › News

Junior makes permanent move back to Norway

Lyndon Lloyd , 20 February, 18comments  |  Jump to most recent
Everton U21 midfielder Francisco Junior has left the club for Strà¸msgodset on a free transfer.

Now 24, the Portuguese has been farmed out on a number of loan spells in recent years in a bid to ignite his career but has now accepted a full time role at the Norwegian club where he spent the majority of last year.

Junior, was signed by David Moyes as a free agent in 2012 after his contract expired at Benfica and not long after he had had a spell with Manchester City's academy. He made just one senior appearance for the Blues later that year in the ill-fated League Cup second round tie at Leeds United and has been on loan at Wigan Athletic this term but felt it was time to move on to other familiar pastures to continue his development.

He will remain on Merseyside in the short term while he recuperates from a groin injury but bade Everton fans farewell on Instagram saying he was sad that he wasn't able to break into the first team at Goodison but that it was an honour to represent the club.

 

Reader Comments (18)

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Colin Glassar
1 Posted 20/02/2016 at 22:39:41
Good luck to him but I thought he'd left years ago.
Andrew Presly
2 Posted 20/02/2016 at 23:57:13
Shouldn't have been thrown in away at Leeds for his debut. One of those "I want you to flop" selections from Moyes.

He tried to do the same to Barkley and was great seeing him squirm on national TV as the rest of the panel sung the praises of England's number 10 tonight. No thanks to you Davey!

Good luck, Cisco!

Anthony Dwyer
3 Posted 21/02/2016 at 02:03:18
Flopped because of his poor attitude Andrew, nothing to do with Moyes.
Jim Bennings
6 Posted 21/02/2016 at 08:52:53
Andrew

What a load of crap mate!

He didn't flop because he was thrown away to the mighty Leeds United, Christ if he was anywhere near decent he should have been the star of the show against a run-of-the-mill Championship team, to blame Moyes is childish.

Like Vellios, Gueye, Anderson Da Silva, and various others, he just wasn't good enough!

Nick Armitage
7 Posted 21/02/2016 at 09:15:42
Gueye. Don't think he'd have got in my five-a-side team at the time. Junior was shocking away at Leeds and watching the scallies baiting the police with Yorkshire Police murderers chants was far more entertaining than watching him floundering.

Peter Degn was another one, I remember him coming on at United and I thought we've got a player here. But, the second time he got the ball, he miscontrolled it and got outrun by the ball boy.

God we've seen some shite down the years.

Jon Withey
8 Posted 21/02/2016 at 09:15:49
Shame for him, but not good enough.

He's still in work though, good luck to him.

Andrew Presly
9 Posted 21/02/2016 at 09:48:55
He was on record as saying he had off-field issues so yeah you can attribute some of this to attitude but surely you introduce these players carefully, not just bring them back from Siberia for a knockout cup game – in this case, a central-midfield role next to an uncommunicative and seemingly disinterested Fellaini, then banish them again when they don't immediately deliver?

Junior wasn't even the worst of them that night and during that season was certainly preferable to Phil Neville in that position!

Shane Corcoran
10 Posted 21/02/2016 at 10:00:57
Andrew, I suppose nobody knows what happened after that Leeds game but, if we were to pick at reasons, I'd wonder why he was never given another chance rather than why he was given the chance in the first place.
Andrew Presly
11 Posted 21/02/2016 at 10:17:43
It is a strange one in comparison to the above mentioned Gueye who seemed to be given, probably, too many chances! How we managed to contrive a situation whereby he was our only left sided option for that cup semi was vintage Everton. But that's another story....
John Audsley
12 Posted 21/02/2016 at 10:29:19
Simply not good enough.

Gueye was a woeful player and the fact he got so many opportunities is mistifying.

I can only imagine he was a Moyes man who worked hard in training and said Yes whenever Moyes asked him to do something.

Junior didn't get a fantastic debut at Leeds in how the team was set up but he lasted 45 minutes and was never seen again... end of story.

Eugene Ruane
13 Posted 21/02/2016 at 11:00:47
24?

Well just an opinion but my feeling is anyone known as 'Junior' should have to change their name to 'Senior' on their 18th birthday.

A little disconcerting to be told 'Oh look, here comes Junior!' only to see a 53-year-old, 6'-2", 17-stone, hairy Portuguese feller in a vest.

By the way, I was tempted to say 'Well at least at Stromsgodset, he won't be able to come back and haunt us', but then no sooner had that thought occurred, than I got a mental picture of RM waffling after a Junior winner against us in a Europa qualifying round 5 years from now.

RM (doing his Scientology face) – "We are disappointed because we lose the game, of course we are, but there were many many good things to see from us. I felt we kept our shape incredibly well and had a very high intensity in the game. And it is a phenom.. er.. wonderful feeling to see the new players starting to gel, particularly Wayne Rooney who gives us that experience that excites all Evert-on-eeons. If we can bring in two more good players who..." [continues until interviewer starts to cry...]

Sondre Haga
14 Posted 21/02/2016 at 11:22:01
A good box-to-box player with a good engine. In Stromsgodset's direct 4-3-3 system he will find his feets again. Not good enough for Everton anyway, a good deal for both clubs.
Minik Hansen
15 Posted 21/02/2016 at 13:14:46
Well, I guess every club have these kind of players regardless a manager. I was excited at the time he came to us with a nice CV and all. Good luck to Junior.
Colin Glassar
16 Posted 21/02/2016 at 16:09:47
We don't seem to have too much luck with Portuguese speaking players do we? Fernandes (did a bunk), Silva, Valente, Junior (all rubbish) Muller (shameful) etc.... Anyone else?
Harold Matthews
17 Posted 21/02/2016 at 21:10:54
Good luck to the lad.
Phil Smith
18 Posted 22/02/2016 at 01:43:05
Eric Dier, Colin?
Andrew Presly
19 Posted 22/02/2016 at 11:00:25
Rodrigo(l), Jo, Xavier.....
John Hodgkins
20 Posted 23/02/2016 at 09:23:15
Phil (#16),

Eric Dier is English. Born in Cheltenham to English parents who moved for 6 years to Portugal. But I take your point!

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