How Rasmus Hojlund went from Copenhagen struggles to £72m Man Utd star in 18 months

There are many ways to get to Manchester United, but Hojlund's is one of the strangest routes imaginable, the type you find right at the bottom of Skyscanner when searching for the cheapest flight possible. Copenhagen to Manchester, via Sturm Graz and Atalanta. Total price: €103m (£90m/$109m).

Copenhagen, however, saw just €1.75m of that when they sold their homegrown striker to Sturm Graz in January 2022 and must have been horrified to see him blossom into one of the top centre-forwards in Europe on his travels.

Hojlund, who is from the outskirts of the Danish capital, began his footballing education with local side HUI and a had a brief stint with Brondby before joining Copenhagen as a teenager. He made his first-team debut at the age of 17 in October 2020, ending the season with four appearances in the Danish Superliga.

He was given more opportunities in his second campaign, making 15 appearances, albeit only one start between July and January. He failed to score in the league but did manage to fill his boots in their Europa Conference League campaign, netting five times across 11 appearances, only one of which was a start.

Hojlund had his work cut out as he was competing with fellow Danish striker Jonas Wind, four years his senior, for Copenhagen's single centre-forward berth. Wind had scored 15 goals the previous campaign, and after a strong start to the season he was snapped up by Bundesliga side Wolfsburg for €12m (£10.5m/$12.7m) in January 2022.

Hojlund would have seemed a natural fit to take the baton from Wind as first-choice striker, but the club were not ready to put all their faith in the then-18-year-old and signed Senegal international Khouma Babacar instead on a free transfer from Sassuolo.

Envisaging more time on the bench, Hojlund left Copenhagen three days before the transfer window shut for Austrian side Sturm Graz.

Moving to Graz side felt like a sideways move at best, if not a step down, especially considering Hojlund's emotional ties with Copenhagen. But being snubbed by his boyhood club did not seem to affect his confidence. Indeed, when asked by his new employers what his playing style was like, he compared himself to Erling Haaland! He was thrown straight into the starting line-up for the next game at WSG Tirol and scored twice on his debut.

"Both in our club and in the media, people laughed or didn’t take it seriously, because he was only 18 and hadn’t really shown anything,’ coach Christian Ilzer told The Daily Mail. "But for me it showed how confident he was. After his first game, where he scored twice, all the journalists knew what he was talking about and saw that there are similarities, with their size, power and finishing ability.

"The pitch is a concert stage and he is a rock star that excites the crowd. He is naturally comfortable in the spotlight. That’s why he is made for the biggest stages."

Tirol defender Raffael Behounek was one of Hojlund's first victims and was left in awe after his debut. "He will be worth every penny," Behounek told Laola1. "He is an absolute machine. When he has space, he is very difficult to defend against."

Hojlund scored in his next two games for Sturm Graz and finished the season with six league goals. He was even more prolific at the start of his second season, notching three league goals and scoring in a Champions League qualifier against Dinamo Kyiv. Atalanta came in with a €17m ($18m) bid in August and the Austrians did not hesitate in cashing in.

"We were sure that he was a diamond that needed polishing. He had everything we were looking for in a striker," Ilzer added. "He surprised me in all aspects. His confidence and attitude for an 18-year-old was exceptional. Also his height, speed, finishing ability and presence in front of the goal was even better than expected. It was like he had been held back before. I wish I could have worked with him longer."

Just like at Sturm Graz, Hojlund scored on his full debut with Atalanta, netting in a 2-0 win at Monza. That proved to be his only goal until the start of the new year as he was forced to make do with substitutes' appearances in Serie A.

He truly settled into the team at the start of 2023, netting in each of his first four matches before producing an exhilarating display in a 2-0 win at Lazio, ravaging the home defence for 90 minutes and sealing victory by sliding in to score.

“Hojlund has this spirit, energy, intensity, but also technical quality that is just remarkable,” said Atalanta boss Gian Piero Gasperini. "He still has so much margin for improvement, too. He is so quick, he’s under 11 seconds over 100m and that’s not even trying very hard. Considering his height, he has a low centre of gravity and can move his legs very fast. I am convinced he’ll have a great career, he just gets stronger every day.”

Hojlund ended the season just as he had begun it, by scoring against Monza. That rounded off the campaign with nine Serie A goals in only 20 starts and put United on alert.

Having turned away from a potential move for Harry Kane due to the England striker's age, Tottenham's huge asking price and a sense of dread at doing business with Daniel Levy, United saw Hojlund as a more attractive long-term investment.

They did not envisage paying the £72m ($88m) fee they would eventually part with in exchange for Hojlund, but Atalanta held all the cards and United felt the striker's potential and his track record for constant improvement meant their investment would be worth it in the long run.

What they have seen so far is what Sturm Graz coach Ilzer described, a rough diamond. Hojlund is capable of breath-taking surges down the pitch when he gets between the lines, as he produced against Galatasaray, but he is still far from the finished article, as demonstrated by the fact he is yet to score in the Premier League.

But United are in this for the long haul, unlike Copenhagen, who cut Hojlund loose just as he was about to blossom. The Danish giants are not the only club that were unconvinced by Hojlund's natural talent, either.

Christian Mouroux, his former coach at first club HUI, has said that Hojlund's brothers, twins Emil and Oscar, who are still at Copenhagen, "were more obvious talents". He told The Daily Mail: "Rasmus wasn’t a standout. There were other players his age just as good. There was no single moment when we thought he was going to be a star. His talents you see today came much later. I won’t lie, I’m very surprised by how much Rasmus went for."

Hojlund compensated for any lack of talent with a bloody-minded quest for self-improvement, constantly practising his shooting and his skills through one-on-one sessions with his father, who built a football pitch in the basement of the family home. And when Hojlund returns to his hometown, he heads back to HUI to practice.

Given how he has witnessed Hojlund's remarkable development in such a short space of time, Mouroux does not blame Copenhagen for not sticking with Hojlund. "I would say the short story behind that is that Rasmus has always been insanely dedicated to his personal development," he told The Manchester Evening News. "Looking back on it, they had a lot of other talented strikers and he was super young, so to some extent I can kind of understand why they did it, they believed in some of the other strikers with more experience than him.

"But I do think they’re surprised he has made this journey he has, that he’s gone through this development at this speed he has. With the knowledge I have of him, it’s not surprising to me because he is so hard-working, he is so dedicated, I cannot tell you how many times I have seen him on his own just training by himself.

"I’ve always known something special was there with him, just in regards to his commitment to his football, but that he has done it at this speed is definitely spectacular."

Under the bright lights of Old Trafford and on what is sure to be an emotionally charged night as United pay tribute to Sir Bobby Charlton, Hojlund has the chance to show Copenhagen first-hand what they could have had if they had shown a little more faith in one of their own.

"It is a special game for him," said ten Hag. "He grew up there at this club and you know he will be highly motivated. That’s for me, for the team, but especially of course from him to send that in the right direction."

The right direction on Tuesday will be the Copenhagen goal and hopefully, for United's sake, back on the road towards the Champions League knockout stage.