Junior in Argentina

Waterford FC and DG Foods found themselves in the Argentine media in recent weeks, in amongst stories of Messi and MacAllister. The famous blue shirt appeared in newspapers and websites thanks to the magical Junior Armando Quitirna.

 

 

Junior is currently playing League One football with Crawley Town alongside other ex-Blues Gavan Holohan and Rory Feely with Tobias Phoenix, Waterford’s former Director of Football, fulfilling the same role at the West Sussex club. The little wizard, adored in Waterford for his displays in 2021 and 2022, signed a two-year contract last July having come from Fleetwood Town for an undisclosed fee.

While Junior has impressed at Crawley and scored six league goals this season to date, it still came out of the blue when one of Argentina’s strongest clubs swooped in to sign him last month. Atletico Talleres Cordoba finished runners-up to champions Velez Sarsfield in last season’s Argentinian league and wanted to add the attacker to their ranks.

This was no wild rumour – the clubs began negotiations and Junior flew to Cordoba, Argentina’s second city, at the end of January. Transfer specialist German Garcia Grova, the South American Fabrizio Romano, confirmed that the ‘extremo zurdo’ (left winger) was signing for Cordoba. He was to be the first person from Guinea Bissau to play in Argentinian football. ‘Football Insider’ Pete O’Rourke reported the deal on this side of the Atlantic and Sussex World called it “potentially the most random transfer of all time”.

 

 

Junior, or Armando as Crawley refer to him, flew to Argentina and “successfully completed his medical, but an agreement could not be reached.” It appears that a fee could not be agreed between the two clubs with the phrase “financial discrepancies” being used.

Crawley issued a statement on February 3rd to allay the fears fans had of losing a key contributor. “Despite various online reports, a deal between Crawley Town Football Club and Club Atletico Talleres was never reached. Therefore, further reports which state that the deal fell through due to an issue with the paperwork are also false.”

The statement went on to explain “The club had received an initial approach from Club Atletico Talleres, and therefore Armando was not available for selection while the two clubs were in communication, which is standard transfer practice. The club wanted Armando to remain as a Crawley player, and are pleased that the 24 year old will spend the rest of the 2024/25 campaign with the Red Devils.”

 

 

Manager Rob Elliott said that “Junior’s flown halfway across the world in the last week or so, but he’s dealt with it really well. He’s been really mature about the situation. It would have been an amazing opportunity for him, but, for one reason or other, it hasn’t happened. But he’s come in and he’s carried on where he left off in terms of being a fantastic human being.”

Junior has since returned in Crawley’s last three league games and scored the winning goal against Stevenage last week. Wishing him the very best of luck for the rest of the season.