{"id":333978,"date":"2026-05-13T14:19:24","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T08:49:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/?p=333978"},"modified":"2026-05-13T14:19:24","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T08:49:24","slug":"darren-fletcher-hails-15-year-old-man-utd-wonderkid-as-amazing-talent-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/2026\/05\/13\/darren-fletcher-hails-15-year-old-man-utd-wonderkid-as-amazing-talent-football\/","title":{"rendered":"Darren Fletcher hails 15-year-old Man Utd wonderkid as ‘amazing talent’ | Football"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Darren Fletcher has an \u2018amazing talent\u2019 on his hands (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Manchester United\u2019s JJ Gabriel has won the Premier League Under-18s Player of the Season award and Darren Fletcher says the club as an \u2018amazing talent\u2019 in its ranks.<\/p>\n

The forward is just 15 years old but has shone against older players within the age bracket, scoring his twenty first league goal of the season on the weekend.<\/p>\n

Gabriel will likely be involved on Thursday as United tackle Manchester City within the FA Youth Cup final.<\/p>\n

The London-born teenager has been capped as much as Under-17 level by England and the BBC suggests he will likely be involved within the Red Devils\u2019 first team pre-season preparations this summer.<\/p>\n

Under-18s boss Fletcher is keen to maintain expectations under control, but cannot deny that the 15-year-old is a standout performer among the many country\u2019s brightest young stars.<\/p>\n

\u2018JJ\u2019s a tremendous talent,\u2019 Fletcher told the BBC<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2018He’s a implausible kid. He brings an enthusiasm to the pitch day-after-day to learn, to need to play, to be on the ball. He\u2019s eager to do higher, to enhance and to learn. He takes constructive criticism well and I\u2019ve got an excellent relationship with him.<\/p>\n

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JJ Gabriel doesn\u2019t turn 16 until October (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u2018I do think we’d like to recollect he’s a child and likewise he\u2019s been a part of a very good team, and the players have helped him as well.<\/p>\n

\u2018But JJ has scored the goals and goals all the time get the limelight. He has a serious future and is someone I\u2019ve enjoyed working with immensely.<\/p>\n

\u2018His next steps are something people above me will determine. We wish him to go up there and thrive, so we’d like to get him within the position to do this.\u2019<\/p>\n

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Gabriel has already trained with the Red Devils first team (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Reacting to winning the Under-18s Player of the Season award, Gabriel told MUTV: \u2018I\u2019m delighted to win this award. I thank my coaches and team-mates for helping me win this amazing award.<\/p>\n

\u2018Since we got here together because the Under-18s, we\u2019ve change into a excellent team. Everyone looks out for one another and all of us work hard for one another. I feel we\u2019ve had a excellent season.\u2019<\/p>\n

He added: \u2018I\u2019d say [the Academy] helped me mature loads. They assist me to be very humble and keep my feet on the bottom.<\/p>\n

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Gabriel\u2019s father Joe O\u2019Cearuill in motion for Brighton in 2007 (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u2018I\u2019m delighted to be working with him [Fletcher], he\u2019s a tremendous coach and has helped me a lot this season to change into a greater player and the most effective version of myself. I\u2019ve got to say you\u2019ve got to take care of understanding on the training pitch each day, giving it my all and dealing hard within the gym to remain fit and never get injured.<\/p>\n

\u2018My family have helped me loads, through tough times and good times. They arrive to all my matches, regardless of how far or close, and I really like them to bits.\u2019<\/p>\n

Gabriel\u2019s father, Joe O\u2019Cearuill, is a two-cap Republic of Ireland international and was once on the books of Arsenal, turning out for Brighton, Barnet and Forest Green Rovers, amongst others, over his profession.<\/p>\n

Arrow<\/title>\n<\/use><\/svg>MORE: Man Utd make Andoni Iraola managerial decision amid Chelsea links<\/span><\/p>\n

Arrow<\/title>\n<\/use><\/svg>MORE: Casemiro hails fringe midfielder at Premier League rivals as \u2018unbelievable player\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n

Arrow<\/title>\n<\/use><\/svg>MORE: Paul Scholes reveals Manchester United \u2018problem\u2019 with signing Cole Palmer from Chelsea<\/span><\/p>\n

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Darren Fletcher has an \u2018amazing talent\u2019 on his hands (Picture: Getty Images) Manchester United\u2019s JJ Gabriel has won the Premier League Under-18s Player of the Season award and Darren Fletcher says the club as an \u2018amazing talent\u2019 in its ranks. The forward is just 15 years old but has shone against older players within the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":333979,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20686],"tags":[34937,10192,7617,10548,5479,9180,1054,2708,20687,21410],"class_list":["post-333978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football","tag-15yearold","tag-amazing","tag-darren","tag-fletcher","tag-football","tag-hails","tag-man","tag-talent","tag-utd","tag-wonderkid"],"aioseo_notices":[{"message":"The permalink for this post just changed! This could result in 404 errors for your site visitors.","status":"warning","options":{"id":"0a2ae5f84bc2c0423042ed7ec22d2e40","isDismissible":true,"actions":[{"url":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/wp-admin\/admin.php?page=aioseo-redirects","label":"Add Redirect to improve SEO","class":"aioseo-redirects-slug-changed"}]},"allowedContexts":["posts"]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=333978"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":333981,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333978\/revisions\/333981"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/333979"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=333978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=333978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=333978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}