Anthony Elanga is a Swedish born footballer, who graduated from Manchester United U21 to play for the senior team, making his debut against Leicester City in May 2021.
Elanga was scouted by both Manchester City and Manchester United, but he decided to join United when he was just 12.
Elanga primarily plays as a left winger and center forward, but he is also accustomed to play as a right winger and left wing back.
He has a total of 3 goals to his name, playing for United from 2020/21 season to 2021/22 season. He has played 11 games in total.
From the above picture, we can see that Mohamed Salah ranks the highest in goals scored per 90. He is also on top of the goal scoring chart with 17 goals to his name. He ranks 0.80 per 90, and Anthony Elanga ranks 0.48 per 90. Elanga ranks 95 percentile, when compared to the Top 5 league.
In goals vs expected goals, Mohamed Salah again takes the cake with 0.85 per 90. Anthony Elanga has 0.50 per 90.
Anthony Elanga ranks 0.45 in key passes, and 1.25 in progressive passes. Troy Deeney ranks the highest with 3.4 in defense splitting passes and 3.5 in progressive passes. When compared to players from the top 5 league, he ranks pretty poorly with him ranking only 0.43 in key passes per 90 having percentile of only 1, and 0.99 per 90 in progressive passes, having percentile of only 1%. He needs to work on his creativity if he has any chance of catching other players.
Elanga ranks pretty poor in passing and crossing into the 6 yards box as the passes either get blocked, or intercepted or he gets dispossessed by the opponents. He ranks only 0.2 in passes into the 6 yard box and 0.25 in crosses. Mahrez takes shoulder above him.
Elanga ranks very high in defensive actions. He usually tracks back and helps out his fellow compatriots out of danger.
In successful pressure, he ranks 5.5 per 90 as he is able to pressurize his opponents to make errors or get dispossessed. However he ranks poor in clearing the ball from the danger zone. He ranks 0.3 per 90.
From the above heatmap, we can see that Elanga had the most pressures in the middle third with 47%. He contributes to defensive and attacking third with 28% and 24% respectively.
We have analyzed the recently concluded match between Leeds United and Manchester United, in which the game looked poised to end at 2–2. But Fred made it 3–2 and Elanga made it 4–2 to put some gap between the both.
It was a 6 goal thriller, which ended with Elanga putting some distance between them and Leeds.
He had one goal to his name and xG of 0.7 , Cristiano Ronaldo had 0 goals to his name but had xG of 0.9.
From the above heatmap, we can see where Elanga made most of the passes.
Elanga Passing Heatmap
Coming to his defensive contributions, he had 0 interceptions and 1 tackles to his name, and he was able to win that tackle too.
Elanga had applied pressure 11 times, out of which he was successful 3 times in dispossessing the opponents, or forcing them to commit errors.
Recently Manchester United played Atletico Madrid in the round of 16 for the UEFA champions league. Atletico Madrid were cruising ahead courtesy of a 7 min goal by Joao Felix.
On came Elanga for Marcus Rashford in the 75th minute. In the 80th minute after a beautiful build up play between Jadon Sancho and Bruno Fernandes, Bruno set up a beautiful pass to Elanga. The Atletico defender was unable to clear the ball, which fell in Elanga’s feet, and he had to shoot past Oblak to make the scoreline evenly poised. It was their first and only shot on target as Elanga became the club’s youngest ever goalscorer in the knockout stages of the Champions League at 19 years and 302 days.
From the above dashboard we can see that Elanga ranks decent in goals scored with 0.57. He ranks high in defensive duties. He ranks high in defensive actions which lead to shots with 90 percentile. He has the most touches in the defensive third, with 80 percentile.
Elanga is good aerially, winning the aerial duels with almost 92 percentile.
Anthony Elanga has tremendous potential to reach the top. He has veterans Cristiano Ronaldo, Edinson Cavani to help him grow as a center forward. Him being only 19 years, he has age on his side to grow into a top talent. He will become the 6th player to come out of academy and play for current Manchester United side, after Marcus Rashford, Jesse Lingard, Paul Pogba, Dean Henderson and Tom Heaton.
