It has taken just 15 years for Alexandre Rodrigues da Silva to progress his football career from an indoor school in Brazil, where he started at the age of three, to his present status as blossoming world star at AC Milan.

He joined Internatcional in Porto Alegre at the age of 11, living in dormitories with scores of other young hopefuls and playing for the youth teams. But in November, last year, he made his first team debut for Internacional at the age of 17, helping them to a 4-1 win over Palmeiras.

Pato created three of the goals and scored the other goal himself to announce his arrival to the world. His appearance spotlighted the young fantasist and created expectations and comparisons with various Brazilian superstars like Kaka and Ronaldinho.

He scored Internacional's first goal of the FIFA Club World Cup on December 13 in the semi-final game against Al-Ahly Cairo, helping his team to win the match 2-1 for a place in the final, which Internacional went on to win.

Pato was destined to join AC Milan and it was no surprise when he signed for them in August in a deal said to be around 22million Euros, which was the minimum buy-out clause in his Internacional contract.

But because of Italian football regulations that state non-EU minors may not be registered in Italy, Pato will not be able to play official matches for Milan until January 3, 2008, when the Italian transfer window reopens. But he has started training with the team and is allowed to play in exhibition games (which he has already done, and scored).