Football
Dermot Corrigan, Madrid correspondent 10y

Spain assistant coach says Munir could be the new Raul

#INSERT type:image caption:Munir made his senior Spain debut against Macedonia on Monday. END#

Spain assistant coach Toni Grande has said attacker Munir has the potential to be another Raul Gonzalez, but urged him to keep concentrating on his club football.

The 19-year-old forward came to prominence when scoring from his own half as Barca's youth team won last season's UEFA Youth League, and in the last month has scored on his debut for Barcelona's first team and played for the Spanish under-21s.

Munir, born in Spain but also qualified to play for Morocco, then made his full international bow as a late substitute in theĀ 5-1 Euro 2016 qualifying win over Macedonia on Monday.

Grande, who worked with the young Raul at Real Madrid, told Radio Barcelona: "We will see how difficult the challenge is for Munir.

"He has potential and an important future -- it all depends on his effort and work. He reminds me a lot of Raul at the start. He has the same characteristics, and look how far Raul went. But first there is his club. He needs to play, in the first team or the B team. Then time will tell."

While Munir said he had never considered playing for Morocco, his father suggested to Onda Cero that he would have declared for them had they called him up first. Spain coach Vicente del Bosque denied he had been called up to prevent him from choosing Morocco.

This has brought up memories of similar past-cases of "fast-tracking" such as that of Copenhagen-born Thomas Christiansen, who was signed as a teenager by Barcelona. He made his Spain debut in 1993 without having played a senior game for the club, and won just one further cap.

Christiansen, now the coach of Cypriot side AEK Larnaca, told Catalunya Radio: "Maybe my call came early, at just 19, the same as Munir, but when you get the call you have to take the opportunity. I believe he will have problems when he goes to Morocco.

"When I went back to Denmark on holiday, some people called me a traitor. But my mother is Spanish, my father Danish, and I took this decision, and I stuck with it. Maybe without injuries I would have played more, but I am happy with what I achieved.

"But I would say they took advantage of the situation to call me up for a game which was not key, to have me for the future. These are not games against England or Germany with a lot on the line -- the game is already over when you come on for 10 minutes."

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