Daniel Farke feels Norwich City could have pulled off a major coup in snaring highly-rated striker Sebastian Soto.

The 20-year-old joined Norwich on a free transfer in the summer, after leaving Hannover, but was farmed out to Dutch second tier side Telstar when work permit regulations ruled him out of Farke’s immediate plans.

Soto’s prolific spell in Holland earned him a senior call up to the USA squad for recent games against Panama and El Salvador.

That boosted City’s attempts to earn a work permit under the new post-Brexit rules on player movement.

Soto could return to his parent club early in the new year, ahead of a potential fresh loan move, should Norwich successfully cut through the red tape.

Farke has kept a close watch on the Californian, but cautions he has to prove himself at a higher level.

“He is impressive. Without any doubt. It is always a good sign when a striker is scoring goals. That certainly is good for the confidence,” he said. “It is difficult to do that at any level.

"He is certainly proving to us he can score goals at his current level.

"We are pretty happy with his development. It certainly seems like a great piece of business by us and I have to give many, many compliments to our scouting and also to Stuart Webber that we were capable of bringing him here.

"We trusted him in a period when no-one else trusted him and he was not in a team in the second tier in Germany at the time.

"But we are not getting carried away, we are not over the moon or think we have signed the new Harry Kane. It is important we stay level and balanced but we are very happy with his development.”

Soto had been suspended for Telstar’s previous two league games but featured in Monday night's 2-1 league win at Ajax II. The youngster also notched a quickfire brace on his international debut in November’s 6-2 friendly romp.

“Great he was called up to the US team and he scores on his debut twice within a few minutes but with all respect to that opponent, it was Panama. It was not against Brazil or Spain or England,” said Farke. “With all respect to Telstar it is not the level we are playing at right now so he will have to prove himself.

"It was a brave call by us. He played in Germany for Hannover. They were involved in the relegation battle in the second division and he was not close to the first team at that point.

"He was training with the first team at times but had no real chance to play in a relegation battle. Our recruitment saw his potential and managed to bring him here. He is rising, he is growing but we have to be a bit careful.”