Hugo Ekitike, Then

There's a new striker in town.

Alright, no time for any grand introductions this week. There’s lots to unpack, with Liverpool on the verge of signing Hugo Ekitike from Eintracht Frankfurt for around £70-80m.

We don’t like strikers on this Substack. But there’s layers to this guy. He’s a really interesting case to weigh up. Lots of positives, but a fair few concerns, too.

Let’s see where we end up.

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So, for those arriving late to the eternal party on this Substack, here’s a short clip explaining why we don’t tend to like strikers. I wrote a piece too. You can read that here.

The good news in this case is Ekitike paints himself as a bit of a forward in disguise. He looks like a number nine — standing about 6-foot-3 — and he can act like one, but he’s generally not the kinda player who becomes a net negative if he doesn’t score.

Ekitike does lots of other things. He possesses qualities that you wouldn’t otherwise expect from a player with his frame. Tall and slim, but pretty quick and full of skills. Nwankwo Kanu vibes. There’s a throwback.

Indeed, his ability to improvise is one of his biggest perks. Zlatan Ibrahimović comes to mind as another slender striker packed full of invention. Ekitike is really creative on the fly.

And thanks to his technical perks, he’s useful outside the penalty box. That, in my opinion, has always been a massive issue attached to Darwin Núñez. Not the finishing part, no, but his inability to engage in possession in deeper or wide areas. He plays football like he’s wearing Doc Martens.

Ekitike is better at connecting with his teammates. His link play in small spaces looks healthy. And he’s great at spearheading transitions by carrying the ball over large distances. There’s echoes of Erling Haaland at Borussia Dortmund in there.

Look at the guys he’s alongside in the above. All forwards, rather than nines who wait for chances on the penalty spot. Leroy Sané, Antonio Nusa, Florian Wirtz, Jamal Musiala, Karim Adeyemi. You can’t see any of the more conventional strikers like Harry Kane or Benjamin Šeško, because they’re grouped with the rest of the pack.

A lot of my concerns regarding strikers in general are alleviated by Ekitike’s surprisingly rounded game. He’s not as one-dimensional as you might think, and it’s worth noting at this point that he’s only just turned 23.

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So he’s not just a striker, but when he’s deployed as one, he can be a handful for the opposition. Ekitike is a keen runner with and without the ball. Eager to press, helpful when defending the front post from set-pieces.

The Bundesliga star gets lots of shots. Even more than Kane last season, despite the former Tottenham Hotspur marksman playing up front for Bayern Munich, who won the league at a canter.

In fact, Ekitike ranked sixth across Europe’s big five leagues for shots per 90 last season, placed behind only Ousmane Dembélé, Kylian Mbappé, Omar Marmoush, Lamine Yamal and Alexander Sørloth.

And again, remember Ekitike played for Frankfurt, the third-best team in Germany. Not Paris Saint-Germain. Not Barcelona. He was forced to create a lot of his own attempts from nothing. A lone wolf. The story was similar when Liverpool analysed Diogo Jota at Wolves. He’ll be much closer to goal at Anfield, with plenty of offensive sparks to combine with.

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Alright, enough positivity. I’m starting to feel nauseous here. Let’s touch on some concerns. The best bit. The stuff everyone ignores when a shiny new signing walks through the door.

So I’m a tad surprised Liverpool are going for Ekitike this summer. Not because he’s bad, no. But because at that price, you’d reasonably expect the finished article.

The Frenchman is good — could be great — but he’s still raw. An unpolished diamond. He still appears at the stage of his career where he’s figuring out what works and what doesn’t on the pitch. Think early Cristiano Ronaldo at Manchester United. Too many stepovers, not enough product. He got there in the end.

Ekitike isn’t efficient yet. That’s probably the best way of putting it. He’s prone to shooting from daft angles. He often dribbles his way into cul-de-sacs. Alexander Isak, by contrast, has ironed out those kinks. You’ll find two examples below from the same match, just 11 minutes apart.

This is why — despite his price — Liverpool might be viewing Ekitike as a bit of a project of sorts. I’m thinking Fabinho and Andy Robertson, who took months behind the scenes to infiltrate Jürgen Klopp’s best team.

His relative inefficiency extends to his finishing. A big talking point attached to his transfer. For those who aren’t aware, Ekitike posted 114 shots in the Bundesliga last term — not including penalties — with those efforts worth a total of 19.3 xG. But he only scored 14 times, underperforming by 5.3 goals.

Below, you can see the top and bottom ten players across Europe’s big five leagues for finishing performance versus xG last season. Now, this sort of thing tends to fluctuate a lot from year to year, so don’t panic. But it’s still curious.

You’re thinking about Núñez aren’t you? Sorry. I’m scarred too, and Ekitike does depict shades of him sometimes. The volume shooting. The efforts from suboptimal spots. The transition game. The apparent alarm before connecting with the ball.

But I’m more sympathetic with him. He’s largely acted as a one-man attack in Frankfurt, often having to initiate moves miles from goal. He takes what he can get. He lacks faith in his teammates. And he’s often shattered by the time he gets near the penalty box because of his constant running.

Also, and this is pretty important, across the 239 shots of evidence that we’ve got across his entire career in the Bundesliga, Ligue 1, Champions League and Europa League, Ekitike has been expected to score 33.5 times, actually bagging 34 goals. Not bad.

I don’t think this guy is a plus finisher. He needs to make better decisions regarding when to shoot. And when he does decide to have a go, he’d benefit from relaxing a bit. But he’s not Núñez. And even if he was, there’s more to his overall package.

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So what’s the verdict, then?

Well, Ekitike has a high ceiling. Think about Isak’s current level. But I think he’s got a relatively low floor compared to the attackers Liverpool usually sign, albeit nowhere near as low as Núñez.

In other words, there’s definitely some form of gamble in there. This one doesn’t feel like a guaranteed hit. I’d feel more comfortable if Liverpool were paying £50m to land his signature, but here we are. This is the world of strikers.

Providing Arne Slot with the option of a nine with box presence is probably the right thing to do this summer, and — given Liverpool’s general approach — it’s pretty cool that Ekitike is a natural threat on the break, too. Don’t forget, Richard Hughes is building a squad here. Like, Gonçalo Ramos doesn’t start for PSG, but he’s still there as an option.

At his best, Ekitike will be occupying entire defensive lines on his own, elegantly linking with those around him and running the channels every five seconds. He’ll bulk up. He’ll make better decisions, refining his shooting to establish himself as a deadlier version of the player we’ve witnessed in Frankfurt.

At his worst, he’ll look out of sync and somewhat wasteful in the final third, while perhaps struggling with the physicality of the Premier League. Seeing him against deep-lying defences will be interesting, too. Although due to his age and skill set, it’s safe to say he should retain most of his value regardless.

I’m fascinated by this transfer. He’s a massive talent at the very least, and I’d rather see Liverpool go for Ekitike than 27-year-old Viktor Gyökeres, or Šeško for £90m. But there’s work to be done here.

Your move, Arne. Better start cutting that diamond.