It seems as though Stefano Pioli will get the midfield reinforcement he has been craving with Soualiho Meite very close to joining Milan.
According to MilanNews, he will arrive in a deal worth €9million in total when factoring the paid loan and the option to buy and is expected to become the fourth option for Pioli’s double pivot in the 4-2-3-1, along with Kessie, Bennacer and Tonali.
Meite cost Torino €11million when he joined from France back in 2018 and since his arrival he has played 94 games for the Granata, totalling 6,650 minutes on the pitch. In his two full seasons he has always made at least 30 appearances.
In his first, he played 35 Serie A games with two goals and three assists, and in the second he made 33 appearances in the league with two assists. In the current campaign, under the orders of Marco Giampaolo, he has made 14 appearances with one goal and one assist, having been left out in recent games due to market reasons.
Looking at the Comparisonator database, he is the third best central midfielder in Serie A for successful dribbles on average: 2.71 per game, only behind significantly more attacking players like Messias (5.15) and De Paul (4.26).
He also ranks highly on ‘attacking actions carried out successfully’ at 3.62 per game, the seventh-best midfielder in Serie A under this statistic. Meité also stands out for offensive duels won (4.61 per game) and is 10th-best midfielder in Serie A for successful through-balls (0.54 per game).
Less positive are his stats on ball recoveries (3.8 per game, 68th in Serie A) and on interceptions (3.62 and 43rd place); on a defensive level, he completes 7 defensive actions on average per game and wins 2.89 duels every 90 minutes.
