One winner and one loser at Leeds United as club secure 18-year-old’s service

Leeds United signed Servette centre-back Diogo Monteiro on a three-and-a-half year deal on transfer deadline day this week.

Phil Hay of The Athletic revealed the fee involved to sign the Portuguese youth international will be around the £1million mark, he said: “Fee understood to be in region of £1m.”

He has been signed with the first-team in mind down the line, but the club have played down his senior chances for now, they said: “[Monteiro] will initially join up with Michael Skubala’s Under-21s squad, as they continue to battle for promotion from Premier League 2 Division 2.”

Quiz: Do you remember how much Leeds United paid to conclude these 15 transfers?

Here, we take a look at ONE winner and ONE loser at Leeds having secured Monteiro’s services.

Winner – Diogo Monteiro

The obvious winner is Monteiro himself who will be training with better players, coached by better coaches, and have better facilities at his fingertips at Leeds.

This is a better environment for him to develop, as long as he has a clear pathway to senior football at some stage in the future.

Fabrizio Romano believes that his involvement in the side at Leeds will be fairly immediate as he is the direct replacement for the outgoing Diego Llorente, who signed for AS Roma this week, he said: “Official, completed. Diogo Monteiro joins Leeds from Servette, deal agreed and signed — he will replace Llorente who’s joining Roma.”

This is despite the club’s stance being that he will be in the development squad for now, their official statement said: “[Monteiro] will initially join up with Michael Skubala’s Under-21s squad, as they continue to battle for promotion from Premier League 2 Division 2.”

Loser – Charlie Cresswell

Cresswell may struggle to find a way back into Jesse Marsch‘s first-team plans with the signing of Monteiro, who probably has a higher ceiling due to his superior quality on the ball.

Monteiro could already be above him in the pecking order, if the player’s quality translates well to English football.

Charlie Cresswell‘s future may be on the agenda again this summer. He turns 21 in that time and needs to be playing regularly at senior level, which looks less and less likely to be at Elland Road.

Leeds are hoping to be able to fast-track Monteiro, which will leave the right-centre-back spot highly competitive from next season.