11 | Jeremy Doku - 2023/24

[grim up north]

He is really poor off the ball. You can tell he simply hasn't ever played on a team where he had serious defensive responsibilities.


You can tell his brain gets its different here and he needs to hustle back at this level. But his body simply doesn't respond well to chasing backwards.

Jesus

 

[Tricky_Trev]

So, so exciting. But, having read through a comments on here, I agree; His tracking back has been sus- looks like he has half the pace when the op have the ball. His touch isn't at the level we have seen from players here recently.

but

I've never been so unexpectedly excited about a signing after three appearances. Has looked unplayable in that left channel. I think he'll dip in and out of the side- maybe start a few games at home. He is only 21 right so we need to manage his minutes well. Would be a fantastic option from the bench if we need some impetus in the last 30mins of big games.

Would also love to see an experimental Doku - Grealish - Foden behind Haaland or Alvarez.(Doku left, Phil right, Jack central left-ish)

I think his pace looks slow when tracking back because he’s all about acceleration and not top speed. Slowing a defender down and exploding away from him kind of creates an expectation that his top speed is also lightning quick but it doesn’t seem to be really. He’s more than quick enough, but he’s not Kyle Walker. His incredible talent is how quickly he can get to his top speed, but a foot race with an opponent going back 50m or so? He struggles to keep up.

 

[madloaf]

Doku squares up his defender.

Me:

 

[Tricky_Trev]

The slight issue with that is that Doku could go past Coufal whilst dribbling the ball, yet wasn’t quick enough to catch him defensively. That can’t be logically right, can it?

You can see after West Ham score that he looks up to the sky. He knew.

Acceleration v top speed. Shorter the distance, the faster Doku seems, as he hits top speed in an instant. But his top speed itself is nothing otherworldly. It’s how instantaneously he gets there that is unreal. Get Coufal and Doku to race each other over half the pitch length and it’ll be a fairly close race. Get them to race over 5m and Doku will have won the race before Coufal has moved a muscle.

 

[kenbelly]

Acceleration v top speed. Shorter the distance, the faster Doku seems, as he hits top speed in an instant. But his top speed itself is nothing otherworldly. It’s how instantaneously he gets there that is unreal. Get Coufal and Doku to race each other over half the pitch length and it’ll be a fairly close race. Get them to race over 5m and Doku will have won the race before Coufal has moved a muscle.

Agree and probably the reason why he will be great against teams that park the bus, which is most of the league.

 

[ws01]

Loving the extra dimension he brings, above all. Very exciting. I felt we were becoming a bit one tone, this guy comes in and adds a lot of spice.

 

[supercity88]

I’m not sure where this need from a lot of people has come from to not describe someone as raw. It’s not meant to be an insult, merely suggesting he’s young and he has stuff to improve on.

The rawness is in his brain. He doesn’t think immediately that he needs to win the ball back asap. That’ll change, I call it rawness. You call it what you want. :-)

Laziness is what I'd call it! You can certainly use raw to describe him though. I would apply it in the sense of positional awareness or a lack of experience. I don't think letting your man run past you unchallenged is raw, that's something an amateur is aware of! I think beating a man and then not picking a pass and running into trouble, or taking the wrong option is raw.

Doku is going to excite and frustrate in equal measure, that's what many wide players will do. He'll get better, even less raw, but he'll still do it I'm sure!

 

[Alan Harper's Tash]

Acceleration v top speed. Shorter the distance, the faster Doku seems, as he hits top speed in an instant. But his top speed itself is nothing otherworldly. It’s how instantaneously he gets there that is unreal. Get Coufal and Doku to race each other over half the pitch length and it’ll be a fairly close race. Get them to race over 5m and Doku will have won the race before Coufal has moved a muscle.

Hmm, that’s a bit concerning as Coufal is hardly quick.

I get Doku has explosive acceleration though.

 

[applejuice]

Acceleration v top speed. Shorter the distance, the faster Doku seems, as he hits top speed in an instant. But his top speed itself is nothing otherworldly. It’s how instantaneously he gets there that is unreal. Get Coufal and Doku to race each other over half the pitch length and it’ll be a fairly close race. Get them to race over 5m and Doku will have won the race before Coufal has moved a muscle.

Coufal is hardly quick. It is more about the defensive sense. As a winger it is the most common rule of defending. He should mind Coufal's position because this is his man to mark. Doku did not give enough notice and did ball watching for 1 second then Coufal was away running toward Eddy.

This kind of mistake happens especially on young players. Pep will improve him for sure.

 

[Gumzy97]

He’s made us more complicated to work out for the opposition. When our left back inverts their winger has to go with the left back which happened a lot against West Ham ,

Bowen went with Gvardiol , leaving Doku 1v1 against Coufal. Doku is just nightmare to defend against his quick agility and speed just creates chance after chance. He’s a special player.

When Ake started inverting in the second half , it left Doku 1v1 against the fullback which then he created chance after chance and could’ve scored a goal. He’s a very special player a full backs nightmare.