Oscar Bobb (born 12 July 2003) is a Norwegian

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

currently playing as a

forward Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward. Forward may also refer to: People * Forward (surname) Sports * Forward (association football) * Forward (basketball), including: ** Point forward ** Power forward (basketball) ** Sm ...

for

Manchester City Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The tw ...

Club career

Early career and move to Portugal

Born in

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

, Bobb played for Lyn at youth level. In 2013, he began being linked with

Portuguese Portuguese may refer to: * anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal ** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods ** Portuguese language, a Romance language *** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language ** Portu ...

club

Porto Porto or Oporto () is the second-largest city in Portugal, the capital of the Porto District, and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto city proper, which is the entire municipality of Porto, is small compared to its metropol ...

, after performing well at a youth tournament in

Algarve The Algarve (, , ; from ) is the southernmost NUTS II region of continental Portugal. It has an area of with 467,495 permanent inhabitants and incorporates 16 municipalities ( ''concelhos'' or ''municípios'' in Portuguese). The region has it ...

. Porto reached out to Bobb's mother, , to convince the young footballer to sign with them, even going as far as to pay for the two of them to visit the club in Porto. In October 2015, Gunnes moved to

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

on her own, before signing documentation in November of the same year for Bobb to be enrolled in the

Portuguese Football Federation The Portuguese Football Federation (FPF) ( pt, Federação Portuguesa de Futebol; ) is the governing body of football in Portugal. The federation was formed in 1914 as Portuguese Football Union (UPF) by the three existing regional associations ...

. Despite the documentation being rejected by

FIFA FIFA (; stands for ''Fédération Internationale de Football Association'' ( French), meaning International Association Football Federation ) is the international governing body of association football, beach football and futsal. It was found ...

in January 2016, Bobb and his mother remained in Porto, and in January 2017 he attempted to sign with Escola de Futebol Hernâni Gonçalves. However, FIFA were not convinced that Bobb's mother had moved to Portugal of her own volition, to pursue an acting career, nor that the Escola de Futebol Hernâni Gonçalves were independent from Porto, and refused Bobb an international transfer certificate. The case reached the

Court of Arbitration for Sport The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS; french: Tribunal arbitral du sport, ''TAS'') is an international body established in 1984 to settle disputes related to sport through arbitration. Its headquarters are in Lausanne, Switzerland and its co ...

, who sided with FIFA, and Bobb was told to return to

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

. He would go on to sign for fellow Oslo-based club

Vålerenga Vålerenga () is a neighbourhood in the city of Oslo, Norway, belonging to the borough of Gamle Oslo. Vålerenga is located between the neighbourhoods of Gamlebyen, Jordal, Ensjø, Etterstad and Lodalen. Vålerenga is in particular known for it ...

Manchester City

Bobb joined

Premier League The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Foo ...

side

in July 2019. In October of the same year, he was named by English newspaper ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' as the best young talent at Manchester City of his age group. After a relatively slow start, compared to other youth players brought in at the same time, Bobb cemented his place in Manchester City's under-23 side, notching a number of assists in his first full season. As a reward for his fine form for the reserve side, Bobb was named on the Manchester City bench for the first time, in an

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual knockout football competition in men's domestic English football. First played during the 1871–72 season, it is the oldest national football competi ...

third round tie against

Swindon Town Swindon Town Football Club is a professional Association football, football club based in Swindon, Wiltshire, England. The team currently competes in , the fourth tier of the English football league system. The club has played home matches at ...

on 7 January 2022, though he did not feature.

Style of play

Comfortable on the ball, and described by Manchester City as a "incredibly technically gifted midfielder", Bobb has been compared to

Argentine Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or (feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, s ...

football legend

Lionel Messi Lionel Andrés Messi (; born 24 June 1987), also known as Leo Messi, is an Argentine professional footballer who plays as a forward for club Paris Saint-Germain and captains the Argentina national team. Widely regarded as one of the ...

for his style of play.

Career statistics

Club

;Notes

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Bobb, Oscar 2003 births Living people Footballers from Oslo Norwegian footballers Norway youth international footballers Association football forwards Lyn Fotball players Vålerenga Fotball players Manchester City F.C. players Norwegian expatriate footballers Norwegian expatriate sportspeople in Portugal Expatriate footballers in Portugal Norwegian expatriate sportspeople in England Expatriate footballers in England