Emerson Royal admits Premier League adjustment period

Signed from FC Barcelona in the summer for over £20m, a lot of pressure was placed on the shoulders of Emerson Royal. The tag of being a Barca player comes with immense pressure. However, fans should remind themselves that Royal had “only” played for Real Betis so far. His time at Barcelona had seen precious little first-team action, and though he started the 2021-22 season as part of the squad he was never likely to break through under Ronald Koeman.

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However, this has not stopped some Spurs fans from being worried that the Brazilian looks ill-equipped for life in England. A big move like this for a young player can be hard to deal with, and Emerson has clearly had some issues adapting. Inconsistency has blighted his game from moment to moment, and has left some fans worried that the club has wasted the best part of £20m on a flop.

The player has admitted one of his primary stresses is learning English, of which he is struggling majorly. Arriving as a deadline day signing at Spurs after expecting to stay in Spain, Royal was unlikely to have been taking English lessons. And from reading between the lines, it does not appear that moving to England was ever part of his career plans.

Emerson was also in talks with Arsenal, who instead agreed to sign Japan international Takehiro Tomiasyu instead. The player has lost three of his first matches in a Spurs shirt in the league, and has found it hard to adapt to such a major change in his life.

What did Emerson Royal say about life in England?

Speaking about his time so far with Globo Esporte, Emerson noted how hard he had found life so far in England. When asked about what he thought of the differences between England and Spain in a wide-reaching interview, the Brazilian added: “English is a little harder to learn!

“Spanish was different, a little more like Portuguese, you could get a bit of a sense of what people wanted to tell you.

“Not here, if you don’t know, it’s hard to understand, because you have no idea what people are telling you. The first few days were very complicated because I didn’t understand anything at all.”

However, he did remark that things appear to be improving slowly but surely, adding: “Today I can understand a lot, I can communicate, not 100%, far from it, but now I can communicate more with people, I understand more things.

“Now I’m going to study more too, it’ll be easier. So I think that language is now a problem, a difficulty, but in a short period of time I’ll work it out fine.”

When asked about what he thought of life in Britain so far, Emerson added: “The strangest thing, in the beginning, is the weather. It’s not that cold now, but you can see that it’s much colder here than in other countries I’ve been in.”

He did, though, admit that he would adapt to both the language and the difference in a climate when given time. For Spurs fans, then, there can be no doubt that the new signing is trying everything he can to adapt to life in a very confusing, challenging new environment.

One of the most famous football journalists, who is living in Brazil and covering Brazil football, Tim Vickery, wrote quite good pieces about Brazil’s World Cup wins and in-depth articles about several Brazilian players It’s an enjoyable read for anyone who follows football, and Brazilian football in particular.

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