Christian Eriksen ready to use a World Cup ticket to realise his ultimate dream

Christian Eriksen has earned the right to display his deliciously sumptuous on the World Cup stages of Russia next summer and that could spell bad news for his current employers.

Eriksen’s sensational hat-trick as Denmark beat Ireland 5-1 Dublin cemented his recently acquired ‘world class’ status and coming on the back of his sparkling display for Tottenham against Real Madrid in the Champions League earlier this month, his value in the transfer market Top 100 rating is rising at a rapid rate.

He may have signed a new contract with Spurs in September 2016, but club chairman Daniel Levy would be wise to consider fresh talks with Eriksen and his agent after a season that has seen him elevate himself towards the game’s midfield elite, ten years after he flirted with the prospect of fulfilling his ultimate sporting dream.

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Eriksen has made no secret of his desire to play for Barcelona over the course of his career, with his experience of having a trial with the Catalan giants when he was just 15 fuelling his ambition to one-day become a hero of the Nou Camp.

The quietly spoken Tottenham midfielder admits he was overwhelmed by the experience of taking part in a solitary training game in Barcelona colours and he was equally out of his depth during daunting trials with AC Milan and Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea.

Now, a full decade later, Eriksen ready to touch the heights many were predicting he would reach back in 2005 and a starring role at Russia 2018 next summer may be enough to persuade Barcelona to come calling for his services once again.

While Eriksen will publicly insist publicly that he is content with life at Tottenham, it doesn’t take much prodding to reveal his true feelings as when rumours surfaced that the Catalan giants were eyeing up a move to Eriksen as their bid to sign Liverpool’s Philippe Coutinho floundered last summer, the Spurs playmaker admitted he would jump at the chance to move to the Nou Camp.

“I don’t think there a lot of players who would say no to Barcelona,” he told reporters in his native Denmark. “In the future I see myself at the highest level. That’s what I dream about. That could be in two to three years. It could be at a different club or it could be at Tottenham, if we have got all the way to that level.”

Those words that cannot have amused his currently employers and left little doubt that Eriksen would back himself to make the grade if his second chance comes with Barcelona.

The Catalan giants are likely to need three or four players to fill the boots of the incomparable Lionel Messi and given his form over the last 18 month, it is not inconvincible that Eriksen could be part of their solution.

His eight goals and 15 assists in the Premier League last season were numbers that confirmed Eriksen has added the consistency to his talent that makes for a potent mix.

Eriksen, belatedly, has plotted a route to the top of the game that fitted his introverted personality, with the 25-year-old reflecting he may well have been overawed by the prospect of trying to make a breaking at a big club when the first chances came his way.

“It was all so different to what I had seen in Denmark,” reflected Eriksen, who was on the books with Odense when he had his trials with Chelsea, AC Milan and Barcelona.

“At my club in Denmark, everything was open and then you go to Chelsea and the gates are shut behind you at he training ground and there is security everywhere. It was a big shock to me.

“We ate lunch with first-team players and you see Jose Mourinho and Didier Drogba walking around, but it was so different. Could I make it there when I was just 15? I wasn’t so sure.

“Then at Barcelona, I played in a match against the Catalonia national team and I cannot remember touching the ball more than three times, honestly. I asked for the ball and it went all around me with the Spanish players passing to each other.

“I was the quiet kid from a little place called Middlefart in Denmark and this was too big for me at the time. Too much too soon. That is why what I found when I moved to Ajax was perfect for me.”

Ajax’s reputation for honing the skills of young stars gave Eriksen a perfect breeding ground to hone his skills when he moved to Amsterdam in 2008 and he credits the influence of Arsenal great and Ajax coach Dennis Bergkamp for helping him to realise his potential.

When the time came to move on, Manchester City and Liverpool were among the clubs chasing his signature, but it was the lure of a Tottenham side flushed with cash following the world record £86m sale of Gareth Bale to Real Madrid that appealed most.

Eriksen believed he had a better chance of breaking into the Spurs team and playing regularly than he would have done at City or Liverpool and he has helped to turn the North London club into the rising force of English football.

Managers Andre Villas-Boas and Tim Sherwood came and went in his first season at Spurs before Mauricio Pochettino arrived to give him the confidence and platform he needed to mature into a world star.

“He is so special. We always call him ‘Golazo’ because he is capable of scoring unbelievable goals and I want him to score more and more,” declares Pochettino. “He is a player that does not need too much feedback from the fans, the media, the people outside, but maybe in the last few months people appreciate what a great player he is and can be.

“He always has a smile, he is a happy person and I like him a lot because he does not need to be recognised. He needs only to feel the love from us inside the club. I like that a lot.”

Pochettino was pivotal in ensuring Eriksen put pen-to-paper on a new four-year contract at Tottenham last September, with reports suggesting his new deal saw him double his wages to around £70,000-per-week. That figure may be more than most of us could dream about, yet Eriksen could earn three times more if he realised his dream of moving to Barcelona or one of Tottenham’s big Premier League rivals.

Until now, that dream move seemed out of reach to a player who has never gone out of his way to seek the fame and fortune of the game’s A-listers, but his rise to the top in the last couple of years means he is now on the radar of the biggest clubs in the game.

After his sparkling display against Real Madrid in the Champions League earlier this month, a golden ticket to the World Cup is now inked into his diary for a summer of 2018 that could end with Eriksen juggling balls on the pitch at the Nou Camp as one of Barcelona’s big signings next summer.

CHRISTIAN ERIKSEN FACTFILE

Born: February 14th 1992

* Started his career with his local club Middlefart and had trials with Chelsea and Barcelona before sealing a move to Odense in 2005.
* He joined Ajax in 2008 and made his way into their first team squad two years later.
* Aged 18, Eriksen was the youngest player to take part in the 2010 World Cup finals, making two substitute appearances.
* Despite strong interest from Liverpool, Eriksen moved to Tottenham for £11.5m in the summer of 2013.
* Eriksen provided 28 assists for his Spurs team-mates over the last two seasons, which put him top of those statistics for all Premier League players.
* He is the top scoring Dane in the history of the Premier League, eclipsing the mark set by former Arsenal striker Nicolas Bendtner with a goal against West Ham last month.
* He has played 73 times for Denmark, scoring 18 goals and at the age of 25, he is has a chance to eclipse Peter Schmeichel’s record as the most capped Danish player of all-time (129 appearances).