Callum Hudson-Odoi is only missing one thing
It's hard to believe that more than two years have passed since the first time Callum-Hudson Odoi took to the pitch for Chelsea's first team. A rare talent who wasn't sent away as part of the Blues' loan army, Hudson-Odoi has had to bide his time waiting for chances at Stamford Bridge. When he has played, he's often shone. And if he can add one more component to his game, the 19-year-old smarterscout young prospect will be able to demand a regular spot in the starting XI.
Let's have a look at Hudson-Odoi's stats at LW, where he's played the most in the league this season:
His attacking output at LW has generally been excellent, and his ball retention has been outstanding as well. He's already one of the better dribblers on the ball in the Premier League, too. What he doesn't do much is defend. He's gotten involved a bit more this season off the ball, but he's still far short of average numbers for a winger in this division. Now let's check him out at RW:
It's apparent right away that Hudson-Odoi's attacking output has been lower on the right. This is at least partially a result of Chelsea's overwhelming left-sidedness, which we've written about before. Indeed, Hudson-Odoi's output at RW was higher last season and ought to have continued to improve, except that Chelsea just doesn't attack as much on that side anymore. In fact, Hudson-Odoi's ball retention is actually better at RW – it's really extraordinary – and he defends more on that side, too.
Nevertheless, we think Hudson-Odoi's future with Chelsea probably lies on the left. Althought Christian Pulisic has played mainly at LW this terms, his most successful seasons at Borussia Dortmund – especially in terms of assists – saw him feature more at RW. When Willian hangs up his boots or moves on, RW may well belong to Pulisic.
So what can we expect from Hudson-Odoi at LW? We used our "Search by metrics" to generate this list of the wingers from Europe's top five leagues who had similar style ratings for shooting, dribbling, and link-up passing, plus ball retention close to Hudson-Odoi's:
It's a pretty phenomenal list. The two closest matches are probably Vinicius this season and Kingsley Coman three seasons ago, when he was 20 years old and a smarterscout young prospect as well. Here's a side-by-side comparison with Hudson-Odoi at LW, all at a Premier League standard:
Like Hudson-Odoi, Vinicius and Coman don't show a lot of defending in these seasons. But they have similar attacking styles and skill in ground duels, and Vinicius's output is identical to Hudson-Odoi's at a Premier League standard.
Coman has grown into quite an aggressive defender as he's come along at Bayern Munich. That's what Hudson-Odoi needs to add to his game, too, especially in the Premier League. If he can perform on both sides of the ball, Chelsea could have a gem – probably on the left – for a decade or more.
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[Photo: cfcunofficial]
