Randal Kolo Muani
Erik ten Hag’s French striker target
With United in the hunt for 321 strikers, it comes as no surprise that French forward Randal Kolo Muani is one of them. He is a name that has been associated with MUFC since the start of the transfer window and has remained a player of great interest to Erik ten Hag.
After having what was a great 22/23 season, many of Europe’s top clubs are keeping an eye on Muani.
If you’re unfamiliar with him, Kolo Muani was the player that missed *that chance in the last minute of the World Cup. Probably something that will haunt him for the rest of his career.
Until he joins the ten Hag revolution that is 😏.
But what makes him so good?
A brief History
Well at 24-years-old, Randal still has a long way to go in his career and much development ahead. The fact that he is at a young age gives whichever club he plays for a forward who could be available for the long-term.
His senior career began at Nantes in France in 2017 where he remained for five years before making the switch to Germany to current club Eintracht Frankfurt.
This past season (22/23) was his first for the German side and was seriously impressive when looking at his style of play as well as the numbers he put up in his 46 games last season.
Style of Play
Randal is quite versatile in that he can play across the front line in all positions quite comfortably. This is already an advantage because we know that Erik ten Hag likes to have a fluid front line as we’ve seen how he likes to rotate between Rashford and Martial in particular.
But Muani’s main role is as the main striker. Muani works in the half-spaces usually in front of his creator teammates like Mario Gotze and Rafael Borre making him the ideal centre-forward for someone like Bruno, the most creative player in Europe last season.
At 1.87m tall, don’t let that fool you into thinking he’s slow. On the contrary, one of his main strengths is his speed and agility. This allows him to be able to use feints creating spaces for him before he uses that speed to give him that initial burst allowing him to get away from his marker.
Put these things together and a player like him is at his best whenever moving into space or creating space for others due to that speed and movement. One-on-ones are another weapon that he has in his arsenal because of the fact that he can knock the ball on and fly past them.
In other words, he’s Marcus Rashford, basically. I mean, there are quite a few similarities to their game when one thinks about it 🤷♂️.
When it comes to progressing the ball, he’s capable of that too as he has 3.12 progressive carries per 90. His dribbles is something that shouldn’t go unnoticed as Kolo Muani has a success rate of 2.27 when it comes to take-ons per 90. That is one of the highest in completed dribbles last season.
In the 46 games he played last season, Randal scored 23 goals and made 17 assists in his debut season for Frankfurt. Holy shit, that’s pretty good 😳. That’s almost a goal or assist a game. Numbers like that show that he is more than just a striker who scores but is definitely capable of setting up others.
His pressing is decent as well. He is usually the first one to start the press as the central striker. Randal also forces the team’s press into a specific area in trying to get back possession.
Playing for a side in Frankfurt who are a counter-attacking side, suits us perfectly in the current moment. ten Hag’s United have also played a predominantly counter-attacking style of football and with the way Muani presses and the fact that he’s speedy, says that he is more than apt to play for this current MUFC side.
Info on Muani via Total Football Analysis Magazine
I compare him to our top goalscorer last season and see how they match up:
Stats via FootyStats
Final Thoughts
Randal Kolo Muani isn’t a name that I was thinking about at the start of the transfer window when it came to strikers, mainly because I didn’t have much knowledge about him before, but also because we usually get the big name players. He isn’t actually that pure goalscorer despite his impressive numbers which is why I never thought about him as a potential candidate for that number 9 spot.
However, due to the heavy links, he seems like a player that Erik ten Hag really wishes to have in his side and after looking into the type of player he is, one can understand why the Dutchman wants the French forward at Old Trafford.
Is Kolo Muani the man to bring the goals for Man Utd?
#KOLOMUANI #ERIKTENHAG #MUFC #GGMU #CMONUNITED #GLAZERSOUT
