Thread by @BarcaFront

Nico González has been one of Barcelona's revelations early in the season, prompting fans to call him an heir to Busquets.

The 19y/o midfielder truly is a big talent but what do we know about his player profile?

Here's a short analysis of his skill set.

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Looking at the stats, Nico is a great ball recycler, retainer of possession & usually the hub of the team.

We can see that from a high volume of passes he plays p90, as well as the incredible accuracy displayed.

He can keep the ball and bypass the press well.

Defensively, he's aware and records a high volume of PAdj interceptions and shots blocked, which indicates a great sense of defensive positioning.

Similarly, he engages in a lot of duels and wins an above-average number of them.

Impressive and quite important.

Offensively, we see that he's used to playing a more advanced role when necessary as he engages in and wins a lot of attacking duels.

He even registers around league average number of touches in the box and above average shot-assists but his final product is still underutilised.

This is imporant as his shooting technique and the way he attacks space up front are on quite a high level.

I won't delve deeper into that here but it is certainly a part of his player profile that has the potential to evolve.

A lot.

But interestingly, his passing doesn't seem to be overly progressive nor creative.

Nico will recycle possession and will often make the right move to advance play but can feel conservative.

His forward passes are extremely accurate and he deploys above-average volume of...

... passes to the F3 but as a whole, we'll often see him pass backward and sideways. Of course, this also has its benefits.

Passing backwards can be crucial in setting the tempo and eventually breaching a compact defensive block.

Below are his passmaps from the friendlies.

We can see this tendency here quite well. The main thing is that he's heavily involved and retains possession at a high level.

Remember, these, along with press-resistance, are some of the key traits a Barcelona pivot needs to have and Nico seems to be groomed as one.

Despite his 6ft 2in (188cm) and 86kg frame, he controls his body well and can twist and turn to beat his marker and escape the press.

However, there are still things that set him apart from Busquets. Nico seems to be taking far too many touches in possession.

I'm not saying he can't play one-touch football but there were too many instances where he opted to control with his far foot and then pass with his dominant right foot.

This can slow down the tempo a lot. Of course, sometimes that is needed but overall he needs to speed up.

Luckily, his speed of thinking & recognising space to occupy are excellent. One of my worries heading into the season was that he might get marked out of the game.

But so far, he's exhibited great positional awareness and is always open to receive a pass or open a new channel.

Here, for instance, he first scans his surroundings to see where his teammates and opponents are.

Then, he moves up to give Frenkie de Jong a new opening. Scanning is a huge part of his skill set and something I absolutely love about him.

Nico scans all the time. Always.

Even though he's been deployed as a pivot recently, Nico is actually able to play across the midfield line, both as #6 and #8.

You could describe his profile as pivot/playmaker hybrid as some of his traits diverge from a traditional DM.

You can actually see in his heatmap and action map that he tends to move up and advance all the way to the penalty area at times.

He indeed has the capacity to play those more advanced roles but I feel he'd need to display more courage in his passing to be a pure playmaker.

Nico will break lines and absolutely has the vision and range to do so. However, at least with the senior team, he hasn't displayed that in full.

Other traits we also have to mention are deep runs & attacking space.

In this aspect, he's more akin to De Jong than Busquets.

He tends to beat the opposition pressure through his runs, dribbling through the defensive block and carrying the ball forward.

This is a valuable skill for a midfielder but perhaps not what Barcelona pivots usually tend to do.

You can see an example below.

I'll finish the thread here because I have to leave something for you to read in the full piece as well 😉

If you want to listen to analysis rather than read it, check out our podcast @johansrondos!

Please find the piece attached below. 👇

totalfootballanalysis.com/player-analysi…

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