Gerard Deulofeu is discussing Barcelona, how the spotlight burns and the pressure can contort, when he mentions the club’s latest wonderkid. “Look at Riqui Puig,” the Watford winger says, with a nod towards the 19-year-old who thrilled on his debut in the Copa del Rey against Cultural Leonesa last Wednesday. “All the people say: ‘He is this and this,’ but you have to be careful because the guy is so young.

“It’s difficult because at Barcelona, you always have eyes on you. All the people speak. It’s good [in one way] but after, it’s bad because the people think you are Messi or a player with a lot of experience. You have to be careful because you have to go step by step.”

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Deulofeu is ideally placed to offer his insight, having once been that Barcelona wonderkid and it is interesting to hear him consider the complications and pitfalls, even if he sometimes stops in his tracks, fearful of saying too much but, at the same time, adding further layers with his silence and gestures. Like almost every footballer, he would never show disrespect.

At the end of the 2011-12 season, it is no exaggeration to say that Deulofeu was the hottest 18-year-old player in Europe. The Catalan had made his La Liga debut for Pep Guardiola’s feted Barcelona team in October 2011 and his Champions League debut for them in December of that year. In July 2012, he went to the European Under-19 Championship with Spain, having won the tournament with them the previous summer, after playing a year up. This time, he was named the tournament’s best player as Spain won again.

“It was an amazing period,” Deulofeu says. “Things happened very quick and you live in another life when you are so young. Because you are so young, you don’t feel exactly how you are doing. Four or five years later, you think maybe you can change some things in that period.

“I remember my teammate, Rafinha, saying I would win the Ballon d’Or one day. Always, you have these objectives when you are young. You think you can be the best and that’s what I have to be because, if not, I’m not playing football. I want to be the best of all.”

Sometimes, the players who are not spoken about a lot, they grow and get better with silence

Deulofeu talks a lot about when he was young but the reality is that he is still only 24. Perhaps, he is an old 24, having lived a life of rich experience.

The central theme of it has been Barcelona, the club he joined at the age of nine and only left for good last January, when he moved to Watford. He will play for them on Monday night at Everton, who number among his former clubs.

Deulofeu had more than one stab at making it at Camp Nou. He returned there from a successful season-long loan at Everton in the summer of 2014, having been named in the first-team squad by the new manager, Luis Enrique, only to be loaned, swiftly and surprisingly, to Sevilla for another season. Under Unai Emery, who is now at Arsenal, that did not work out.

Deulofeu then moved permanently to Everton, although Barcelona inserted a buy-back clause in the deal. He resumed positively at Goodison Park before falling from favour under Ronald Koeman, who had replaced Roberto Martínez and, after a productive half-season loan at Milan from January 2017, Barcelona took up their option and re-signed him. Deulofeu made 10 league appearances and three more in the Champions League under Ernesto Valverde in the first half of last season before he was ushered towards the exit.

“It was difficult [to leave] because I’m an academy player of Barcelona,” Deulofeu says. “I think I played really well under Valverde and in the league, we had a lot more points than the team do now. We were good but after in Barcelona some things happen – some players, they are not agreeing with.”

That sounds a little cryptic, a hint at the forces that can be in play at the club. Deulofeu had wanted to go step by step, to develop more naturally as a teenager, away from the hype, but it was impossible. The depth of his precocious talent made it so; the modern fixation with the next big thing made it so.

Deulofeu also felt that his lofty reputation came to be a problem for his managers – they were under pressure to ensure that he fulfilled his potential but, equally, they did not want to rush things.

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“The expectation levels were so big and for some coaches, it’s difficult to manage this,” Deulofeu says. “That’s what happens. Sometimes, the players who are not spoken about a lot, they grow and get better – with silence. There was pressure on some of my coaches and sometimes, they said: ‘Ah, he’s young and he has to grow up.’ But no. Maybe at 18, 19 years of age, that was my best period and if any coach had played me in every game and given me confidence, maybe things would have happened in a different way.”

Deulofeu cites Ronaldinho as his boyhood hero. “Always that happiness, that smile,” he says of the former Barcelona forward, and Deulofeu’s game is similarly built on spontaneity and expression. But he has long appreciated the need to balance it with productivity.

“When you get to 14, 15 years old, when you feel you are close to the first-team, maybe you start to feel that it’s a job,” Deulofeu says. “There is a specific mentality that is put into the young players at Barcelona and from nine or 10 years old, you have to make good seasons because if not, you are out. In my [birth] year – 1994 – it was just me that arrived to the first-team. You’ll see every year, all your teammates, gone. Because of that pressure at Barcelona, it’s difficult.”

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Deulofeu had hoped to play more under Tito Vilanova at Barcelona in 2012-13 – he made four appearances in all competitions as a substitute – and he has struggled, at times, to win the trust of his managers. Luis Enrique did not fancy him and Emery felt he did not have “that maturity or capacity for sacrifice.” Deulofeu says he was “not happy with the period with Emery at Sevilla” while Koeman at Everton was “not the best – that’s why I wanted to go to Milan”.

Watford’s signing of a player of Deulofeu’s pedigree was a coup and now that he has overcome a couple of injury problems, the challenge for him is to find consistency; to shed the label of an all-or-nothing player.

“I feel that I can be a regular at Watford,” Deulofeu says. “I got another injury in pre-season but I’ve played the last eight games now, I’m playing good and the second part of the season is the most important for us. Our target should be a top 10 finish. That’s realistic. I’m happy here and I know that I’m an important player. I have to show this every week.”