Sebastian Soto is hoping to use his loan spell with SC Telstar to impress Norwich City.
The American youth international joined City from German side Hannover after electing not to renew his contract with the club.
City are hoping to progress his career via the loan route - a pathway which has proved successful for Ben Godfrey and Todd Cantwell in the past.
For Soto, the opportunity to impress his parent club is something he’s relishing.
“I am really, really excited to be joining Telstar. Really eager to get back onto the pitch and start scoring goals again,” Soto told CBS Sports. “It was a choice to further my development. The goal is to get me on the pitch as much as possible and score as many goals [as I can]. For that reason, I’m really stoked for this opportunity.
“The biggest factor was getting myself to a place, to a club and a league where I can play as much as possible.
“Of course, without putting so much pressure on myself, it is in the back of my mind that Norwich is going to be watching, and hopefully Gregg (Berhalter, USA coach) will be watching as well, but at the end of the day, I just want to focus on myself,” Soto said.
The 20-year-old’s decision to leave Hannover was met with surprise by many - after all, the striker was on the cusp of breaking into the US men’s national team after an impressive U20 World Cup that was bettered only by Borussia Dortmund striker Erling Haaland on goals scored.
Explaining why Soto elected to leave Germany, his agent Michael Moore told CBS Sports: “Some journeys are different. And we need to make up for what was effectively a lost year these past 12 months at Hannover.
“They are a big club who were relegated and started the season very poorly. Soto was competing with four other experienced strikers for minutes,”
“It was a struggle, especially as he refused four offers to extend his contract at Hannover. And on numerous occasions when he wanted to play in the Hannover II team, he was refused permission.
“Telstar will allow him to get those games and learn from a very experienced coaching staff of Andries Jonker and Edgar Davids.”
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