Yesterday Newcastle United confirmed the signature of Coventry City youngster Gael Bigirimana, and many of you may just be wondering who he is, so here’s a little bit of info about Newcastle’s latest addition.
Gael Bigirimana is an 18-year-old midfielder from Burundi in Africa, where he played football barefoot. He came over to England via Uganda in 2004 aged 11 and begged to be allowed into Coventry’s academy, which he duly was.
The rest as they say is history, as he developed from a defender into a central midfielder player and continued to develop on the football pitch.
He really broke onto the scene last season, where he featured 26 times for Coventry in the Championship and his performances won him the division’s Apprentice of the Year Award, which is handed out to the most talented youngster.
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He obviously impressed Alan Pardew and co. who have signed Bigirimana up on a five-year deal for an undisclosed fee thought to be in the region of £1m and will go straight into Willie Donachie and Peter Beardsley’s Development Squad.
Bigirimana describes himself as an all-rounder, saying: “If I have to do a job for the team, I do the job for the team; if I have to play as a holding player, I’ll hold; if I have to play more as a creator, I love creating and I love the style that Newcastle play.”
An insight into Bigirimana also comes from Coventry’s former recruitment officer Ray Gooding who says Gael stated when he arrived that: “‘Of course I’m good!’ So he had loads of confidence even back then as an 11-year-old.
“After ten minutes he came over to me and said, ‘Ray, this group is no good for me. I’m better than them’”. So he isn’t short of confidence!
Bigirimana, like many of Newcastle’s current squad, is also deeply religious, as he showed in this celebration for the Sky Blues last season…
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