Scouting Report: Fiorentina & Montenegro Striker Stevan Jovetic

Posted by

City will be getting a forward with many different strings to his bow should the Montenegrin agree to move to the north west next season. 

Check in to Transfer Window: Done Deal Alerts

With Manchester City reportedly on the verge of sealing a £28 million deal to sign coveted Fiorentina front man Stevan Jovetic this summer, we at Caughtoffside are here to provide you with the low down on the highly rated Montenegro international ahead of his expected move to Eastlands.

Watch Jovetic in action below:

The big-spending Premier League outfit are just one of a number of clubs from across the Continent who have been tracking the 23-year-old over the past few years, with fellow top-flight rivals Arsenal, Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool all at one stage or another having expressed an interest in the skilful attacker, and for good reason too.

Jovetic, or ‘Jo-Jo’ to his team-mates, has been a star in the making ever since first breaking into the Partizan Belgrade side  in April 2006 aged just 16.

And it was not long either before the Serbian giants named the player as their new club captain following the departure of previous skipper Antonio Rukavina to Bundesliga outfit Borussia Dortmund, with Jovetic becoming Partizan’s youngest-ever leader aged only 18 years of age in Jan 2008.

However, a few months later the forward was on his way to Serie A, having been snapped up by Fiorentina in May of that year for a fee of just £8m, which now looks like a bargain, with Jovetic going on to prove himself to be one of European football’s most accomplished front men in the intervening five-year period.

For British audiences, Jovetic first came to prominence when netting both goals in a 2-0 win over Liverpool in the group stage of the Uefa Champions League in Florence in September 2009, only for the player’s progress to then be halted when he suffered a career-threatening knee ligament injury during preseason ahead of the 2010-11 season which would subsequently rule him out of that entire campaign.

But Jovetic made a successful return from injury for Fiorentina in the 2011-12 season and has not looked back since, his resolve appearing to have been strengthened by that setback and now after five hugely successful campaigns in Florence, the Montenegrin appears ready to move up a level by signing for Manuel Pellegrini’s high-flying side this summer.

What is sure, though, is that if that big-money deal does go through as expected, then Jovetic will have no problems whatsoever in making the adaptation to the peculiar demands of the English top flight.

For one thing, the striker has the exact type of physique to be able to stand up to the rigours and rough and tumble that will come his way in the Premier League, while one of the main attractions of signing Jovetic for Pellegrini is his versatility, with the player more than capable of operating as either a lone front man, a wide forward or even in the ‘hole’ behind a fellow striker.

And while just 40 goals  in his 134 matches in all competitions since arriving at Fiorentina in the summer of 2008 may not seem like impressive attacking numbers to the naked eye, including only 35 strikes in his 116 Serie A contests for his Italian employers, those stats actually mask Jovetic’s true worth as a player.

In fact, the the forward is just as effective and deadly operating outside the box in wide areas supplying goals for team-mates as he is inside the penalty area putting the finishing touches to moves.

Consequently, City are set to get their hands on a multifunctional footballer with the skills, technique and all-round determination to be a huge success at Eastlands both next season, and going forward, as England know only to well after competing against Jovetic in a Montenegro shirt on a number of occasions in the international arena since 2008.


More Stories ACF Fiorentina