Marc Cucurella has compared Cole Palmer to Lamine Yamal and named his Chelsea teammate as a ‘special character’.
Spain defender Cucurella will come up against Palmer in the final of Euro 2024 this weekend, as La Roja take on England at The Olympiastadion in Berlin.
Palmer was named Premier League Young Player of the Season after an excellent debut season at Chelsea in 2023-24, in which the 22-year-old led the division for combined goals and assists.
The forward has had to be patient for a chance with England this summer, with each of his four appearances coming from the bench, but showed his quality with the assist for Ollie Watkins’ semi-final winner against the Netherlands.
Having seen Palmer up close this season, Cucurella called him the England player he most fears ahead of this weekend’s final. The Spaniard labelled Palmer a ‘special character’ and compared him to Spain sensation Lamine Yamal.
“He has not played a lot at Euro 2024, but it has to be Cole Palmer. His football brain works so quickly, he is always a step ahead of the rest,” Cucurella told The Athletic.
“His decision-making is almost always excellent, and that sort of intelligence is the most difficult thing to defend against, you just can’t predict what he’ll do next. I’ve suffered a lot in training.
“He reminds me a lot of Lamine Yamal. Same style of player. He is a guy who does not care too much about anything. They don’t take life or themselves too seriously. If you ran into Palmer in the streets, you would never tell he is a footballer. But then he plays and… oof.
“He arrived at a tough time for Chelsea, when the team was struggling, and he made an impact from the start. That helped him a lot to keep growing and getting more confident. If you manage to get those kinds of players in a situation of confidence, they make the difference. I’m so happy and hope he carries on like this… but after this weekend!
“He is a special character. He is so serious. When people see him, it’s not like he is instantly likeable. It’s difficult to explain, but when any team-mate sees me they instantly know I am up for a joke and that we can engage in that way. But he is always so serious.
“Still, we got along well, really quickly, since the first training sessions. We were doing mini-matches in training, five-a-side, and the coaches put us together in some. From there, we clicked. Whenever we were on the same team, we would never lose. We had this joke of being the winning team and that’s how our good bond started.”
