Finishing fifth, winning the Dutch Cup for the first time in history, and bagging a UEFA Cup berth for next season - Vitesse, who have been playing in the top flight for 28 consecutive years, have just capped off a season of marked improvement. As the only Chinese player in Europe's top league, youngster Zhang Yuning's footprints at Vitesse naturally won't avoid the limelight.
This season, Zhang Yuning delivered the following report card: 16 league matches, collecting 1 goal and 1 assist; 3 Dutch Cup matches, collecting 1 goal and 3 assists; 9 reserve team matches, collecting 1 goal and 2 assists. No representative work, also failed to improve significantly, mediocre and even some bad data, Zhang Yuning in the waiting and wandering in carrying thousands of Chinese fans to stay in the dream.
Before we talk about Zhang Yuning's season, we might want to mention the name Ricky van Woofswinkel. After all, Zhang Yuning's current status and prospects at Vitesse are closely related to the Dutch "Alphabet Brother".
The 28-year-old Van Wolfswinkel, nicknamed 'Van Golden Wolf', started his career at the Vitesse youth academy, where he moved from Vitesse to Utrecht in January 2009 and gained a lot of attention in the 2011-2012 season with 14 league goals. Unfortunately, Van Ginkelwolf lost his goal-scoring boots after moving to another country, with stints at Sporting Lisbon, Norwich, St. Etienne, and Real Betis almost smoothing out the Dutch striker's edges.
At the end of July last year, Van Wolffswinkel was back where he started, standing dully in front of a yellow and black bordered mirror - along with the return of a long-lost aura, of course. This season, Van Wolffswinkel scored 20 goals in the league, just one short of Feyenoord striker Jorgensen, who won the Golden Boot, and scored perhaps the most important goal in the history of the team in the Dutch Cup final, contributing to Vitesse's historic title win.
Apparently, in the eyes of new Vitesse manager Henk Fraser, Van Wolfswinkel, who is at the peak of his career, is a better option than Zhang Yuning. You may want to take a look at the following three stats related to this season's Dutch Eredivisie.
First, Zhang Yuning has only played 2 starts, and in both of those games, Van Ginkelwolf didn't make the roster due to injury.
Secondly, Zhang Yuning and Van Ginkelwolf have been on the pitch for the team at the same time for only 148 minutes, which is only a paltry 4.8% or so of the season's total.
Thirdly, manager Fraser has chosen to play with a single arrow in every game. And in 80 previous league games in charge of The Hague, Fraser had only tried a two-striker setup nine times - with a dismal two wins out of nine.
Zhang Yuning in the direct competition with Fan Jinlong in the overall disadvantage, can only long time sitting on the bench, in fact, it is reasonable. On the one hand, from the point of view of technical ability and game experience, seniority is still shallow Zhang and experienced Fan Jinlong has a clear gap; on the other hand, the two are similar to the style of play, and the manager's long-term tactical preferences, but also to make the idea of the double striker can only stay in the game occasionally need to fight for their lives stage.
If the compression of playing time due to individual ability and coaching style is not a cause for undue concern for young players, what Zhang Yuning urgently needs after this season's polishing is a clearer definition of his own style.
So far, all of Zhang Yuning's goals for Vitesse's first-team squad have been scored with his head, without exception; and in the naturally physically disadvantaged world of East Asian soccer, Zhang Yuning's physical conditioning is indeed considered exceptional. But first of all, Zhang Yuning's height of 1 meter 84, it is difficult to take the name of a high center forward in the European league where long people run all over the place; and more cruelly, Zhang Yuning's header stats are far from being as outstanding as outsiders think. In the league this season, Zhang Yuning only completed a total of five successful top of the head, 22.7% of the header success rate is even worse than the height of only 1 meters 77 teammates Nathan (25%).
In fact, Zhang Yuning probably shouldn't be tied down by role cards such as 'striker' and 'bridgehead'; instead, his style of play is highly in tune with the modern trend of soccer. Similar to many of the new generation of wingers, Zhang Yuning has some good footwork and tends to play wide in the center of the field, and can deliver a quality ball after dropping back. The next samples are from Zhang Yuning's debut against Feyenoord, with a pass distribution map and a hot zone map - you should be able to get a good idea of his style.
In the off-season, Zhang Yuning and the coaching staff of Vitesse are faced with a choice to be seriously considered: whether to continue to put on weight and enhance strength in order to get the upper hand in the fight with the big waisted muscular men? Or in order to get rid of the lack of teammates to support the dilemma, and polishing technology to improve the ability to hold the ball?
Of course, as a regular center forward, shooting is naturally a must for Zhang Yuning. This season, the fragmented playing time has affected Zhang Yuning's goal scoring efficiency, while the 23% shooting rate is also a bit out of reach. In the two indicators of running without the ball and goal-sensing, Zhang Yuning's overall performance is still remarkable; however, if he wants to become a qualified goal scorer, Zhang Yuning has a lot of room for improvement in the timing of the shot and the control of the power of the shot.
Frankly speaking, Zhang Yuning's talent is hardly exceptional, so this teenager's growth path may be more worthwhile for fans to look at with a long-term perspective. At the end of this somewhat uneventful journey, a little more patience, a little less impatience, a little more encouragement, a little less ridicule - after all, the road in front of him is dotted with too many Chinese fans fantasizing about the stars and the sea.
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