I SAW an interview with Kevin De Bruyne recently where he said he got more enjoyment out of creating goals than scoring them.
As a striker, there’s no feeling like the one when the ball hits the back of the net, so you can understand that comment baffles me.
While I also take great pride in creating goals, nothing comes close to being the man on the end of a move. However, I believe what De Bruyne said, mostly because my team-mate Pascal Gross has exactly the same mentality.
Not only that, Pascal is running both De Bruyne and his Manchester City team-mate David Silva close for the most assists in the Premier League this season, even though we’ve scored significantly fewer goals. He has five so far and I’m very happy to have benefited from his brilliant delivery of the ball and unselfish attitude in front of goal. The archetypal No 10 is a skillful player who is more interested in being in possession than tracking to get the ball back.
Not Pascal. He’s in the top ten players who’ve run the most miles in the PL so far. He’s become a key player for us already and his work ethic fits right in with our team philosophy at Brighton. I’ve had many strike partners over the years and usually their aim is to outscore you — and take great pleasure in doing so. Again, not Pascal. If he’s one on one with the keeper and there’s a team-mate in a better position to score, then he isn’t blinkered and will make the right pass to benefit the team.
I think it’s part of the German mentality where the team is more important than individual glory — and prioritising team achievements explains their consistent success at national level.
Pascal’s remarkable stats certainly back that up, as he created 95 goalscoring chances playing for Ingolstadt in the Bundesliga last season. I had a good feeling about him as soon as he joined up with us for pre-season in Austria. You wonder whether a guy who’s proven himself in Germany’s top league will come in with a big attitude. Not a bit of it. He’s a very humble person and, when he stayed behind after training to hit crosses and help the strikers, we knew we had a great addition. When he places the ball on a set-piece, you know he’s going to deliver a ball which will cause all sorts of problems for your opponents. The space between keepers and defenders is referred to as the ‘corridor of opportunity’ — a well-hit pass in there has the goalie questioning whether to come into traffic and defenders unsure of whether or where to clear the ball.
From The Sun
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