Why €100m Antony is the perfect signing for Man Utd, Bruno and Sancho
Neel Shelat
- 30 Aug 2022 13:09 BST
- 7 min read
Manchester United have completed the blockbuster signing of Ajax attacker Antony.
After signing Tyrell Malacia and Lisandro Martinez, they returned to shop in the Eredivisie for the 22-year-old winger. They have paid a whopping €100 million for the Brazil international.
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So why were Man Utd prepared to shell out so much money for the ex-Sao Paulo man?
One major factor, of course, is his connection with current Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag, formed during their time together at Ajax. That alone is hardly the justification to spend such a hefty sum of money, so it is worth digging deeper into what qualities Antony will add to Manchester United’s attack that they are currently lacking.
2021/22 season at Ajax
As always, our first step is to understand the player’s style of play, and there is no better way to do that than to analyse their most recent full season.
Antony started over 20 Eredivisie matches last season, returning with eight goals and four assists. His pizza chart provides a good overview of his greatest strengths – shooting, chance creation and dribbling.
The area of the pitch the Brazilian winger made his own was close to the touchline on the right side of Ajax’s attack, as his touchmap shows.
His role here was pretty simple – stretch opposition defences by staying as wide as possible, which would often lead him to receive passes in situations where he would be isolated against the opposition full-back, after which he could use his stellar dribbling ability to get past his marker before shooting or creating a chance for a team-mate.
The high dribbling volume and completion rate along with the impressive shooting and creation statistics in his pizza chart proves that he was successful in this task.
Being a left-footed player, Antony favoured cutting inside after receiving the ball out wide, as is evident in his progressive carries map from last season.
It was from this inside-right area around the edge of the box that Antony dealt most of his damage, both in terms of chance creation…
… and shooting.
These are the situations where the Brazilian winger pulls off his show-stopping tricks, of which you probably have already seen many compilations.
Here is a short sequence showcasing what Antony is all about, from a match against Fortuna Sittard this season.
Receiving a pass with his back to goal and a defender trailing him, the Ajax man cleverly flicks the ball over the opponent’s head with a superb first touch.
Some of the attributes that contribute to his superb dribbling skill are his frightening pace and fast acceleration, which make him very difficult to catch once he is gone. In this instance, he quickly creates a large gap between himself and the defender as he drives into space with the ball.
He ends up getting outnumbered in the final third, but even then he ensures that possession is not lost by chopping back onto his left foot and drawing a foul.
In essence, Antony has everything you could want in a winger – tremendous skill, pace, a good understanding of the game, and substantial end-product to cap it all off.
What Antony uniquely adds to Manchester United’s attack
Manchester United are severely lacking quality dribblers in their squad. Paul Pogba had the highest average of dribbles per 90 in the league last season, so after his departure, the only player left who can claim to be a strong dribbler is Jadon Sancho. The thing about Sancho, though, is that he lacks an outstanding turn of pace, so he typically relies on off-ball movements from his team-mates to help his ability to get past a defender.
Manchester United’s wingers are otherwise not prolific dribblers, and truthfully not always at their best with the ball at their feet. The arrival of Antony changes that as he has the individual capability to get past an opposition defender thanks to his mesmerising ball control and speed.
Regardless of whether Ten Hag shifts to a more transition-based style of play that he used against Liverpool or sticks to the possession-dominant philosophy he showed at Ajax, Antony will be a key player in either case. His speed and one-on-one ability make him a menacing counterattacking threat, but they also make him a real weapon against stubborn low blocks.
The Brazilian winger also appears to compliment the skillset of those around him in the Manchester United squad. Due to his tendency to hold width on the right, he would not be able to form a great relationship with an overlapping full-back and prefers someone who stays deeper or inverts, like Noussair Mazraoui at Ajax last season.
Ten Hag’s first choice in the position, Diogo Dalot, has shown real similarities to the Moroccan international’s work at Ajax in terms of his areas of involvement on the pitch so far this season. Their heatmaps clearly indicate this.
Additionally, Manchester United’s build-ups under Ten Hag have generally been biased to the left as Bruno Fernandes tends to prefer drifting to that side of the pitch. This means that Antony should often find himself isolated on the far side of the pitch with the opposition full-back, which, as we have seen, is a situation where he excels at causing problems.
Good news for Sancho
At first glance, Antony’s arrival might not seem positive for Sancho since he would be a direct competitor for a position in the starting line-up, but it is possible that the Brazilian winger could help extract the best out of the ex-Borussia Dortmund man.
Sancho would undoubtedly have to cede the right winger position to the new signing, but that might not be such a bad thing for him, even though he excelled on that side of the pitch at Dortmund. The real reason behind that was Achraf Hakimi, the world's most attacking wing-back in recent times. Sancho needs such a partnership on the wing to unlock his full potential, but at Manchester United, Dalot’s reluctance to overlap means such a connection is impossible.
On the left, however, both Malacia and Luke Shaw have the capability to get forward regularly and pose a threat in the final third, so Sancho could form a strong partnership with either of them. Meanwhile, Antony and Dalot should work well on the right too for reasons we previously discussed. In this way, this could be a win-win situation for all parties in the Manchester United squad.
Antony will be a very good signing for Manchester United. While the transfer fee is unquestionably very high, the circumstances of the move – how late it is in the window, Ajax’s reluctance to sell and Manchester United’s need to buy – make it understandable at least.
Of course, United could have avoided this situation by being more proactive about their transfer business, but that is a different story. At the very least, they are improving in the sense that they finally appear to be targetting the right players that suit the squad and the manager’s playing style.
