Felipe Anderson Pereira Gomes (born 15 April 1993), known as Felipe Anderson, is a Brazilian professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder, winger or forward for Serie A club Lazio. He has previously played for Santos, West Ham United and Porto, and was also capped by the Brazil national team twice.
Early and personal life
Born Santa Maria, Distrito Federal, Brazil, Felipe Anderson grew up the youngest of five siblings. His upbringing was poor, and he had to borrow football boots from his friends to play.
Club career
Early career
Felipe Anderson began his career in Associação 14 Companhia de Polícia Militar Independente (CPMIND), in his hometown of Santa Maria at 6 years old. In 2006, he was moved to Federal FC, and later to Sport Clube Recreativo Gaminha FC. After some impressive performances on the club, he was moved to Paraná to play for Astral EC, finishing the year. In 2007, he was moved to Coritiba youth side, and then in 2007 summer he was moved to Santos.
Santos
Felipe Anderson then played for Santos' youth categories, and was promoted to the senior squad following a rash of injuries in October 2010. He began training with the senior side and signed a professional contract until July 2013. He made his debut for Santos on 6 October 2010 as a 90th-minute substitute in a 3–0 win against Fluminense.
His first goal of his footballing career came on 11 February 2011, when Felipe came off the bench at half time to replace Keirrison against Noroeste, scoring from a long range shot in the 70th minute. On 7 September, he scored his first league goal, against Avaí. In November, he signed a new contract with Santos, running until 2016.
In his following season, Felipe Anderson had more chances in first team alongside Neymar, due to Ganso's injuries and Elano's poor form (both players left Santos in the middle of the season). On 9 February 2012, he scored his first goal of the season, against Botafogo-SP.
On the 31 January 2013, the agreed transfer to the Italian club Lazio for €7.5 million failed due to late arrival of a necessary international fax from Brazil to close the deal.
Lazio
On 25 June 2013, Lazio agreed a €7.8 million fee with Santos, and Felipe Anderson signed a five-year deal worth €800,000 a year. Santos received 50% of the transfer sum and third party owner Doyen Sports would get the rest. Lazio's sporting director Igli Tare criticised Doyen Sports for numerous times delaying the transfer, "It will remain in history as the most paradoxical and shocking negotiations I have ever been a part of", said Tare. "These third party owners changed their minds continually. When we had everything decided, they would start from scratch two hours later. It all happened for a full week, so it felt like being in the Twilight Zone."
2014–15 season
In his second season at the club, Felipe Anderson achieved 10 goals and nine assists in 27 games across all competitions by April 2015. This included the concluding goal as Lazio defeated Varese 3–0 in the fourth round of the season's Coppa Italia, and an assist in both legs of the tournament's semi-final against holders Napoli, the one in the second leg providing the winning goal by Senad Lulić. In March 2015, Felipe Anderson signed a contract extension at Lazio, renewing his contract until June 2020. He played the full 120 minutes of the Coppa Italia final on 20 May 2015, a 1–2 loss to Juventus.
2015–16 season
In July, it was announced that Felipe Anderson would not be wearing the number 7 shirt that he had worn in his previous season with Lazio, but that he would instead be awarded the number 10 shirt. On 8 August, Felipe Anderson appeared in Lazio's 2–0 defeat to Juventus in the 2015 Supercoppa Italiana. On 23 September 2015, Felipe Anderson scored his first goal of the season in a 2–0 victory against Genoa. After scoring the second goal in a 3–1 Europa League win against Rosenborg on 22 October 2015, Felipe Anderson scored twice in a 3–0 win against Torino three days later. In February 2016, Lazio publicly denied rumours that Manchester United had agreed a transfer for Felipe Anderson. Felipe Anderson finished Lazio's season with nine goals in all competitions, coming runner-up to Antonio Candreva in Lazio's scoring charts for the season.