Brazilian twins Fabio and Rafael Silva arrive in England on
Monday to begin their careers with Manchester United - but they
cannot play for The Red Devils until the summer.
United spotted the talented Fluminese pair - both full-backs -
playing in a youth tournament in Hong Kong two-years ago. After a
trial in 2006, Sir Alex Ferguson wasted little time in landing the
duo - but he has to wait to get his hands on the highly-rated
players.
Now after two years jetting to England for brief stints - the
17-year-old pair have been given the green-light to complete their
switch to United and they will arrive on Monday with their
famiy.
"After eight visits to Manchester United, we will travel to live in
England," said Rafael who is a right-back, whilst his brother Fabio
is a left-back. "In the last two years we went there about every
three months, we stayed for ten days and then returned to
Fluminese. "This time we will have the whole family, father, mother
and my older brother's wife with him."
Rafael revealed that the duo cannot wait to move to Europe and they
are buoyed by the recent impact of Alexandre Pato at Milan - who
scored on his debut last weekend. "We know there are Brazilians of
our age doing well, Anderson, who is our friend, at Manchester
United and we talk to [Liverpool's] Lucas who used to be at Gremio
by MSN," he continued. "But the greatest example for us is
Alexandre Pato, who knows perhaps we can follow the same path as
The Duck?"
Neither player has been able to feature for Fluminese's first-team
as United have been keen for them to look after themselves. "The
club feared that we could be hurt," said Fabio. "We would have
preferred to play, but there was also the fear that the fans would
have wanted us to stay. "We have just continued to train - but it
is a pity we have not had the chance to play in Rio as a
professional.
The duo will not officially be able to play for United until they
turn 18 in July but Fabio - Brazil's Under-17 captain - has some
hope that he could yet play in the Olympics. "I will of only been
in training for six months, without a game, at Manchester United
and at the most I will have played a few friendlies," he said.
"This will probably remove me from the Brazilian team, although
Dunga has praised me and Jorginho [Dunga's assistant] has already
talked to me about the Olympics."
