Analyzing Leroy Sane: Strengths and Weaknesses
After an underwhelming start to life at Bayern, mostly due to playing in the RW position, Leroy Sane has regained his past destructive form which he left back at Manchester City following a 54.8M Euros transfer to German giants Bayern Munich in 16 August, 2020. Mostly playing as a right-winger under Flick, Sane has been put back to his LW position under Nagelsmann and he hasn’t disappointed. With 4 goal contributions in just 5 games, he seems to have been working his way right up to the top, where he belongs.
Introduction
Born in January 11,1996, the 25 year old winger has previously seen much success under Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City where he won 2 Premier League titles in a span of 4 years. Initially coming from Schalke, he was a part of the City team that won the “Centurion” in 2017. But why hasn’t he been at his best at Bayern? That can mostly be attributed to his preferred position being the Left-Wing position, where he can makes runs or cut back to either pass or shoot. His crosses from the left are mostly driven, while the ones from the right are mostly in air. When playing against a high-block, Sane relishes the space it offers him, making runs all the time. When playing against a low-block, Sane tends to hug the sidelines, dragging the full-back with him and then either cutting in to take a shot or going out for a cross. He is one of the most explosive wide-forwards and uses his pace and dribbling capability in 1v1 situations or counter-attacks. Even though he may appear to be foul-prone on the eye, he is quite good at evading them. He is a master at creating and attacking spaces, dropping deep many a times to create space for the striker to run into.
Analysis
Attacking Output
During his time at City, Sane was a literal beast on the left wing, and one of the foremost reasons that the defense could never switch off when playing City.
As we can see from his time at City, he rarely uses his right (weak) foot to take shots, scoring only 1 goal from a right-footed shot. One of his main weaknesses is his inability to take shots with his weak foot. This is also one of the main reasons he had been a little out-of-form for the last part of his stint with City where the defenders forced him to play the ball on his weak foot as they knew he wouldn’t shoot from that position. Also, his aerial presence is almost null, which though can be due to City’s style of playing.
As we can see from here, his shots are mostly taken from the right due to Flick playing him as a right-winger. Just as before, absolutely no use of his weak foot and his aerial presence, even when playing in a high crossing team like Bayern.
Although it wouldn’t be right judging his numbers on last season, his underlying numbers were pretty solid although the npxG/shot was quite average.
Movement and Carries
Sane isn’t very skillful at making passes, but instead is very proactive and explosive and excelling at ball carries. But one aspect of his counter-attacking game is slowing down to bring other players into play.
As we can see here, Sane slows down, passes the ball to Mendy, thus bringing him into play and ultimately goes on to score. Something I like to call “Pass and Move”. Although it cannot be essentially labelled as Holdup Play, it is something relatively close to it.
As said before, his explosiveness was one of the main reasons defence’s couldn’t afford to switch off even for a moment against City, something we don’t really see now that he’s left. As in the example above, Virgil Van Dyjk is caught startled by that explosive run, although credit also goes to that wonderful through ball.
Another example here vs Netherlands, jump starts his run suddenly, barely giving De Ligt time to move. He makes up for his poor first touch and takes the shot with his left foot, ultimately going on to score.
Given his poor season at Bayern, Sane ranked quite high in terms of carries when compared to other attacking players.
Spaces
The most important and best aspect of him game is to create, find and move into space. Either be by attacking spaces or by dropping down to create space, Sane certainly excels at what he does best.
Watch how he is initially running slowly, and then suddenly increases his speed when he sees the space in front of team. He might not be that hunky of a figure, he certainly has the technique to remain on the ball even when pushed.
Again as we can see here, he starts his run at the first glimpse of space, something he does best when playing out from the left wing.
On a related note, Sane is quite good at receiving passes, mostly progressive,
Given his style of play, it doesn’t come as a surprise that Sane is very good at receiving passes. Although I expected the number to be less given his lacklustre debut season at Bayern, it is actually still quite high.
Shooting
Although Sane might be very one-footed, his left-foot does not disappoint. When playing on the left, he likes to shot directly with his left in contrast to when playing on the right when he likes to cut back or dribble through his opponents and then shoot.
Here, vs West Brom, on the left, Sane doesn’t cut back or dribble but goes directly for the shot, going on to score a banger of a goal.
Something I was talking about before, his shot taking vs low blocks. Receives the ball in wide areas and most often cuts back to take a shot, just like in the above example vs a West Ham United side, where he managed to score yet another banger of a goal.
A bonus video here, what a banger against Liverpool!!
Dribbling
Leroy Sane is one of the most effortless dribblers in the world, skipping past players like nothing. Combined with his explosive pace, it makes him one of the most dangerous players in 1v1 situations and counter-attacks.
Watch how he receives the ball to his chest, successfully getting past one player, taking on another next and successfully creating for a himself a lot of space from where he ultimately goes on to score.
Sane has been one of the most successful dribblers in the world when compared to attacking players, scoring a large number of goals as a result of dribbles.
Defensive Output
While it may not seem so, Sane contributes heavily to his team’s defensive duties. Most of his contributions are in the form of high pressure as he doesn’t make much tackles.
While Sane doesn’t directly win the ball back, he plays an important role for the team, making the opposition lose possession with his high pressing.
Conclusion
At the age of only 25, there’s no doubt that Leroy Sane is one of the best explosive wide forwards in the world right now. With the influx of inverted wide forwards into the game, we can only expect his stocks to rise. However, he has a big minus point in the form of his aerial and weak foot presence, something he has to rectify in order to become world-class. He also has to play a larger part in the passing game of him team apart from his attacking contributions. However, there’s not denying about the amount of talent this young winger has. For me, there’s only one way for him from now on and that is up, up to the top!!
Hope you enjoyed reading the article as much I enjoyed writing it. Include your thoughts in the comments section or in my Twitter account. And until I write my next one…
