One of the reasons that AC Milan are so keen on signing Joshua Zirkzee is not his goal tally individually but rather the notion that he will multiply the tallies of those around him.
As La Gazzetta dello Sport report, Zirkzee scores much less than Viktor Gyökeres, Santiago Gimenez, Jonathan David and even Benjamin Sesko – the other striker targets linked to Milan – but he makes his team-mates happier.
He improves them, sends them through on goal and plays with them. It’s not so much the number of assists that matters – there were only four in the last league season – but the way in which Zirkzee creates space.
He can be found playing as an attacking midfielder or a winger, a attacking midfielder or a defensive centre-forward, always increasing the coefficient of unpredictability. The Dutchman convinced everyone at Milan that he is the right man, even if €10m in commissions will be needed.
The evidence
Riccardo Orsolini, before playing with Zirkzee, scored between six and eight goals in a Serie A season, but in the last two seasons he has scored 21 (11 and 10). Alexis Saelemaekers had never gone past two goals in the league, with Zirkzee he doubled it to four.
Giovanni Fabbian, in his first Serie A season, finished with five. It is clear that each of them plus the coach Thiago Motta are deserving of merit, but the clues continue beyond Bologna.
Kouamé, who played with Zirkzee at Anderlecht, scored eight (league goals) with him: a career high. Benito Raman, in the same team, scored nine. Adding together the previous two seasons and the following two, he reaches 11 in four years.
The beneficiaries
Some Milan players might be taking note of this, with Rafa Leao leading the list. In the last year he has scored more in Europe but little in the league: nine goals, under double figures.
The Leao-Zirkzee pairing would be all or nothing. They risk being too peripheral, not occupying the area, attacking the space poorly and always wanting the ball at their feet for one-on-ones. However, they are potentially devastating: if they found a way to play together, they would be a huge nuisance for everyone.
Christian Pulisic on the other hand scored 12 goals in Serie A during the 2023-24 campaign. He would have a good chance of repeating that, or potentially doing even better given that he likes central movements and attacking space.
Samuel Chukwueze dropped from six goals (in La Liga) to one (in Serie A) – he can and must do more. Chukwueze often creates goals on his own, with improvisations starting from the right, but Zirkzee would give him a great hand too.
Then there are Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Tijjani Reijnders. In a Milan side where few attack the goal, RLC is the exception: he scored six goals in the league, 10 in all competitions, yet with Zirkzee he could do better.
However, no one can grow like Reijnders, who celebrated three goals in Serie A but threw many opportunities in the bin. His compatriot and potential future team-mate Zirkzee can help him overcome his great limitation.
This guy should play as a 10. Not a 9.5.
Or maybe is has something to do with Motta, because he never really impressed before and Motta was the only coach who gave him space, it doesn’t mean he will do well ar Milan with a different coach and a different team
I dunno… I still prefer a traditional, ‘spot on’, striker by trade. But let’s se how this will unfold.
This commentary is fan fiction
What we Milan fans need to also take note is to trust this owners and the directors as they did well in the T-Market last season with all their buys hitting good figures in G/Ass.