Everton goalkeeper Joao Virginia has detailed how he had to adapt to life in England, including getting accustomed to some strange eating habits when he first arrived in the country.
Record cover comments from the goalkeeper today made in an interview with DAZN Portugal in which he discussed his early years in England.
The goalkeeper moved to the UK to join Arsenal all the way back in 2015, joining the Gunners youth ranks from Benfica’s U17 side.
It’s been a meandering journey for him since then, moving to Everton’s U23’s in 2018 and enjoying loan spell with Reading, Sporting Club de Portugal and SC Cambuur before returning to Everton in 2023 as their number two.
Each of those has seen him adapting to a new league, new lifestyle and customs, but he admits those early days in England were probably the toughest.
“In the first year, there was a huge physical difference. When I arrived, at 16 and already 1.90m tall, I weighed 78kg. When I finished the season, I grew 3 centimetres, but I gained 12kg,” he said.
“What happens in England is that, when a player arrives from abroad or from another city in the country, he chooses a family that lives locally, near the training center, and goes to live with them.
“I went to live with an Italian family that had a nice house. They made our meals – lunch was at the gym. There was a week or two times when my host family was on vacation, and I had to go to other families.
“The meals were a disaster. There was one time they called me for dinner at 5 pm and it was spaghetti with ketchup.”
While that might not have been great for Virginia, the lessons he learned at Arsenal certainly were thanks to the players he was working alongside.
His time at Arsenal saw him end up alongside several big-name goalkeepers, with Petr Cech, David Ospina, Wojciech Szczesny and Emiliano Martínez all at the club at the same time.
Cech in particular is considered one of the greatest goalkeepers to have played the game, particularly in the Premier League, and Virginia admits he was one of his own idols.
“When I arrived [at Arsenal] there was Emiliano Martínez,” he added.
“Later, when I trained with them in the first team, there was David Ospina, Szczesny and Petr Cech. It was a pleasure to train and learn from them, especially Petr Cech, someone I always followed.
“When I was a kid, he was one of my idols. Meeting him in person, talking to me and taking the time to teach… He is a person who loves to talk and is always there for us. We would stay here talking for 2/3 hours and he never got tired.”
