While the club jettisoned most foreign-born players subject to the rule, Onana’s promise was so high that he was persuaded to stay at the academy, where he was allowed to continue training every day but not play official games. The break in the competition has affected. “You can practice all you want, but in the end you train to play,” Onana said. “And if you don’t, it will affect you mentally and physically.”
By the time Onana was 18 years old and eligible to play again, Barcelona had signed Marc-André ter Stegen, a promising German goalkeeper, and Claudio Bravo, who had just helped Chile win the Copa América. Onana knew, he said, that his future lay elsewhere.
He decided to try his luck in the Netherlands and a year later he established himself as the best goalkeeper of Ajax. He was only 19.
The timing couldn’t have been better. Ajax, like Barcelona, had a passion for home-grown talent, and the talent that was just starting to come into its first team proved to be the best of its generation. And the ball skills that Onana honed at Barcelona were perfect for the style of his Ajax.
Success soon followed, as did strong performances against wealthier clubs in European competitions such as the Champions League. By the summer of 2020, some of these teams began to swirl, offering Ajax millions for the young goalkeeper. Ajax refused to sell, confident that the price of Onana and other young stars would continue to rise.
And then, like a few years ago, everything stopped for Onana when his drug test came back positive. Onana filed an appeal against the one-year ban he was given, and the European football authorities accepted his explanation.
But under the rules of football, he was still liable, and so the sentence, reduced to seven months, meant that, as of February 2021, Onana was effectively expelled from football. When his Ajax teammates raised the trophy that spring to celebrate the title he had contributed to, he was not allowed to enter the stadium to watch.
