Ruud van Nistelrooy must teach Bilal El Khannouss what Brendan Rodgers taught James Maddison
Bilal El Khannouss rounded off 2024 with one of the most confident and most technically brilliant individual performances seen at the King Power Stadium this year.
The Leicester City playmaker was terrific in the way he weaved around challenges, switched play and threaded through passes. Against an opponent full of world-class players, he showed the potential he has to join their ranks.
But he did not want to bask in the praise. He said: “I’m not impressed because this is the Bilal I know. I will continue to work on this and build so I can show this every week in the new year.”
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That is often the difference between those at the top and those just below: the consistency to perform at that level nearly every week. But beyond that, what else can El Khannouss build on?
Not only is the answer quite clear, the method for improvement has been shown in City players gone by. The work done by James Maddison under Brendan Rodgers and by Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall under Enzo Maresca are the examples to look to.
Simply, as an attacking midfielder, El Khannouss has to contribute more goals and assists if he wants to level up his game. He has a combined three for City so far, at a rate of one every 269 minutes. Goals is the particular issue. He’s netted just six times in 128 senior matches for club and country.
But it’s almost meaningless to say that an attacking midfielder has to up their numbers. It’s obvious. The crux of the matter is how they do it.
In the December of the 2020-21 season, while watching Sky Sports analyse a City victory over Sheffield United, Maddison heard Jamie Carragher say he needed to get his numbers up if he wanted to get himself into England contention.
At that point, he had 19 goals in 92 appearances for City, not a poor tally. But after sitting down with Rodgers and analyst Jack Lyons and looking at where he could improve, he scored 26 goals in his next 78 outings. He went from a one in five player to a one in three.
The key was getting into the box more often. He didn’t always need to be there to receive it in dangerous areas around the penalty area. He needed to gamble more often on penetrating the box and finding himself in better scoring positions.
In his final two seasons at City, Maddison had far fewer touches in the attacking third than in his first three seasons, but he had more touches inside the box. In those final two years, he registered 39 goals and assists in the Premier League. He’d managed 36 in the three seasons prior.
Rodgers said: “James, what we’re saying to him is to not just be a player who can play between the lines, and take the ball to feet, but to be a running number 10. Go and break the lines, go and get beyond, and it’s something we’re constantly talking with him on.”
Maddison himself added: “It’s about breaking into the box and getting beyond the last line and almost smelling where the ball is going to drop. It’s not an easy thing to do.”
This was true for Dewsbury-Hall last season too. He was playing in the Championship and in a more advanced position, but he was encouraged immediately by Maresca to get into the box more often. He scored twice in the opening match and ended up with 26 goals and assists.
That brings us back to El Khannouss. This season, he has had eight touches inside the box. Even in his brilliance against Man City, there were only two moves where was in possession in their area. For context, right-back James Justin has had 25 touches in the box this season. Wout Faes has had 13. Caleb Okoli, who has made the same number of starts as El Khannouss, has had seven touches inside the box, just one fewer than the Moroccan.
In the moves where he’s not involved in the build-up, and even some of those where he is, El Khannouss needs to take the gamble on getting himself into the penalty area. From there, he is intelligent enough and skilful enough to make things happen.
In terms of his career, there is no urgency. He’s only 20 years old and has plenty of time to improve. In terms of City’s season, if Ruud van Nistelrooy can help El Khannouss develop that part of his game so that he gets even two or three more goals than he would do otherwise, then it could make a huge difference.
