USA U20 attacker Joshua Perez signs deal with Fiorentina

After years of being linked with Fiorentina, United States youth international Joshua Perez has finally completed a move to the Serie A club, the youngster announced on Twitter today. Clubs usually don't announce youth signings officially, so this is as much of a confirmation as we'll ever get.

Very happy to announce that I have officially signed with @acffiorentina and I want to thank all my friends and family for supporting me

— Joshua Perez (@Josh__perezzz) February 4, 2016

The dynamic attacking player has training many times with the club over the years and presumably have been trying to find ways around FIFA's age limit rules. Those attempts fell on deaf ears and Perez was forced to wait until his 18th birthday (Jan. 21) to finally join the Italian club.

Perez joins fellow U-17 teammates Christian Pulisic (Borussia Dortmund) and Haji Wright (Schalke) to join big European teams in the last 12 months. He's a diminutive but skillful winger who prefers to play on the right side of the attack to cut on his deadly left foot.

It should be very interesting to see how he progresses with Fiorentina and if he's able to break into the first team in the future.