Alexandre Lacazette – The Real Deal

There’s some world class strikers currently plying their trade in the French leagues. Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Edinson Cavani and Andre Pierre Gignac just to name a few, but Alexandre Lacazette has slipped under the limelight and only this season is getting the recognition he deserves.

Background

Lacazette is a Lyon boy through and through. He was born in May 1991 and by the age of 12 he was already signed up by their academy. From the age of 16 Lacazette has represented every French national team from the Under 16’s to the full national team, making his full debut in May 2013.

Lacazette jumped into the Lyon side that was on the decline, after years of dominating French football, the introduction of PSG and their money spelt an end to their dominance. 33 league goals in 106 games is hardly clinical, but with 17 in the last campaign alone, he has hit a rich vein of form over the last two years.

This Season

The Lyon forward has really been highlighted as one of the brightest players in Europe so far this season as he’s helped guide his club side, Olympique Lyonnais 4 points clear at the top of Ligue 1.  So far this season Lacazette has notched 21 goals in 22 league games, and with Lyon having scored 47 goals in total, the Frenchman has been vital in their title challenge to date.

He also couldn’t get much more clinical in the cup competitions. In Lyon’s two Coupe de France games Lacazette has scored twice and in their only Coupe de la Ligue match he scored too. It’s really not a surprise that some of the biggest teams in Europe are being linked with a move for the 23 year old.

As a write this, Lacazette couldn’t be in better form. 10 goals in 6 games along with three man of the matches, Lacazette has alone picked up a number of points for Lyon. You may have seen some of the tweets doing the rounds in the last week or so which places the Frenchman third top goalscorer in Europe right now, excluding penalties, beating Diego Costa and only behind the best two players on the planet.

Reportedly Lacazette is out for the next three weeks with injury, which involves the matches against both AS Monaco and PSG, which could really put a dent into Lyon’s title hopes.

Lacazette is many people’s ideal striker having seen him play multiple times this season. Very comfortable with the ball at his feet and with bags of pace, he can walk round defenders with ease. Teams know how much of a threat Lacazette now is when facing Olympique Lyonnais.

The forward is Lyon’s most fouled player this season purely because defenders can’t cope with him. He won’t win any European awards, but just looking at his stats this season, he is not far off the two players considered the best in the world.

Rumours

With Lacazette’s form over the last 18 months, clearly there has been large interest from all over Europe. In the summer, Barcelona, Real Madrid and PSG were the biggest names linked with the forward, and now, coming towards the end of the January window rumours have sparked up again.

Both Arsenal and Liverpool are rumoured to be hot on the tails of Lacazette. Whether or not they can cash up the supposed £25million transfer fee remains to be seen.