“I was young,” Wesley laughs, eyes widening. “I couldn’t go in and elbow Diego Costa.”
With a grin as wide as he is tall, the Aston Villa striker recalls his first training session with the first team at Atletico Madrid. “I played there when I was 17 for six months. I was a little bit afraid with these big players there – Diego Costa, Miranda and Raul Garcia – but it was amazing.”
Slightly fearful at 17 – but by that point, he’d already had to do a lot of growing up. Things came early in life for Wesley, apart from perhaps the football.
Two goals against Norwich before the international break saw the 6ft 3in Brazilian alongside Liverpool’s Mo Salah in the Premier League scoring charts but it’s a world away from where he might have been, had it not been for perseverance.
Wesley’s dad passed away when he was just nine years old. “When my father died, it was difficult because my mum was alone with me and my brothers but she worked and now today I do everything for her.
“When I finish training, I call my mum because she is everything. My mum did everything to help me play so every day when I come home, I call her.” It’s not just his mother and brothers, who he has supporting Villa from back home in the south-east of Brazil.
“I had my first child when I was 14 years old. It was difficult because it was during this time that I started to try and play football professionally. I had to work in the day and then go to training in the evening.”
Playing football and being a father while he was still a teenager proved a tough balancing act, but he began to take the sport more seriously when baby number two came along. “I was 14 when I had my first kid, and 16 when I had my second. When I had my children, I told myself I had to do everything to be a football player.”
It was a lot of pressure for Wesley to deal with; the Premier League must seem like a breeze. “When I play, I have to think about my family, my kids, my mum, everybody.”
Shorter spells in France went the same way and he soon found himself back in Brazil working in a factory. “I had to do something,” he says. “I had to get money for my kids. I would go to a team and every team said no. I went to six teams before going to Slovakia.
“When I went to the sixth team, I thought I didn’t want to play football anymore. I thought it was finished for me. Then I got a chance.”
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