Rio Ngumoha's parents sent immediate warning after Liverpool starlet's Newcastle heroics

The jubilant, wide-eyed celebration of Rio Ngumoha against Newcastle United could well become an iconic moment in Liverpool's history. A matter of days before his 17th birthday, the young prodigy netted a stunning winning goal to secure a 3-2 away victory for the Reds over the Magpies.

However, before the inevitable flood of endorsement deals and media attention comes his way, former football wonderkind Sonny Pike has urged his family to protect him from opportunists looking to cash in on his talent. In the 1990s, at just 14 years old, Pike was dubbed 'the English Maradona' and had sponsorship agreements with the likes of Paul Smith, McDonald's and Mizuno.

All these deals, along with numerous media and television opportunities with shows like Blue Peter and Fantasy Football , were negotiated by his father, a builder who had no interest in football until Pike's skills were discovered, despite the youngster wanting to concentrate solely on honing his abilities.

On the field, Pike had caught the eye of Ajax, who regularly flew him from his home in Enfield to Amsterdam, where he trained alongside stars such as Wesley Sneijder and Rafael van der Vaart. However, the immense pressure and external distractions took a toll on his mental health.

The final blow came when his father signed him up to feature in a TV documentary, which involved a camera crew filming him during his trial period for Chelsea . They were under the impression the documentary makers were simply making a programme on the child's incredible football ability, but it was actually a documentary titled 'Coaching and Poaching', insinuating Chelsea had their sights on him while he was still with Leyton Orient.

An FA tribunal decided to ban Pike from the game for a year, effectively quashing his passion for the sport and all but ending his hopes of making it in the beautiful game. Pike's harrowing experiences serve as a cautionary tale for families of gifted youngsters dreaming of reaching the top.

Speaking to the Liverpool Echo , Pike, who now dedicates himself to his one-to-one football coaching business , shared some sage advice for Ngumoha's family and others in similar situations. He said: "Looking at my whole journey, I would say this is a sprint, but it's with hurdles. It's not a 100-metre dash. This is a marathon with hurdles.

"Getting him on the pitch might be the first hurdle, but then you've got all the dramas that come with it, all the fame that's going to come with it. It's also about how their families react to all the attention as well, because it's not just him.

"There'll be people trying to get into his mum and dad or his cousins and everything else. It's just all sorts of layers of pressure, coming in from different angles. It will be, 'Can we do this? Can we do that?' People coming in here, money, everything else, sponsorships and that. But to be fair, with Ngumoha, I haven't seen too much media attention, so it seems to be from the outside looking in, they're doing a good job with him off the pitch."

Ngumoha's clinical strike at St. James' Park is a clear indicator that the player, snapped up from Chelsea in the summer of 2024, has what it takes to make it big at Anfield. Not only did he score on Tyneside, but he also netted a stunning goal during a 4-1 pre-season thrashing of Athletic Bilbao.

Pike has no doubts about Ngumoha's abilities on the field. As long as his home life is stable and the football is left to him, Pike does not believe there is a ceiling for the teenager. He continued: "If they're good enough to play, I don't really see much on the age side of it.

"For me, it's more the environment and how they're looked after off the pitch. That's what I think all the time. The main thing is controlling the environment around them. By the time I was 15 I'd had four or five agents by then.

"It's a big difference. Can they get people around them to help manage the pressure, because they're going to get a lot of people around them that want to be around them just for their own benefits."

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