Alex Kay from The Daily Mail Writes: Long before he was cutting open Premier League defences with his passing and reminding us that footballers with beards are not just a Seventies fad, Juan Mata was knee deep in football.
Knee deep in a Hackney Marshes sense, that is, wading through mud on boggy pitches in northern Spain, a little boy trying to stick to his footballing principles.
Most great football players have an incredible background story..Mata and obviously the likes of Ronaldo, Ronaldinho & Zlatan