Zachary Athekame is a 20-year-old right-back who is very much on the radar of Serie A’s AC Milan, as the I Rossoneri need a promising right-back to reinforce their squad.
Massimiliano Allegri has been using the 3-5-2 formation during the friendly games he played so far in the pre-season camp and was relying mainly on Alexis Saelemaekers, Álex Jiménez, and Yunus Musah for the wing-back role.
As Musah is mainly a midfielder, Allegri tactics are more likely to use Musah there if the Athekame deal goes through.
He would logically use Jiménez more as an alternative to Pervis Estupiñán on the left flank, rather than having three players competing for the same right flank role.
If Zachary Athekame’s transfer deal is not completed, however, Jiménez will remain Saelemaekers’ backup on the right.
Jiménez would be the best possible option as an alternative to Estupiñán following the departure of Theo Hernández, with Davide Bartesaghi becoming the plan C option for that role.
Getting a natural right-back who can rival Saelemaekers will benefit Allegri and the team, which should create a healthy rivalry that will push both players to perform better.
Zachary Athekame’s market value is only €5m; therefore, it will be less complicated to opt for him rather than for a more established player with a higher market value.
At the same time, Athekame’s potential and abilities are excellent for Milan’s standards.
He has what is needed to further develop at Milan and battle for a starting spot without much pressure.
AC Milan are pushing to get the services of a promising talent who can become a much more useful right-back in the coming seasons and who can already add squad depth and quality on the right flank this season.
This player analysis and scout report aims to further explore Zachary Athekame’s playmaking and defensive traits, identifying his strengths and shedding some light on his weaknesses and margin of progress.
The analysis will also compare Zachary Athekame and Alexis Saelemaekers using data analysis and statistics, since the latter has been Allegri’s first choice on the right flank until now.
Zachary Athekame Player Profile & Role At AC Milan
Zachary Athekame is a natural right-back who has been used mostly in defensive lines with four defenders, especially with his current club, Young Boys.
Nevertheless, he has experience playing as a right midfielder and a wing-back, meaning that he is capable of interpreting these roles without problems.
This tactical fluidity and adaptability will be much needed if he moves to Milan, as playing in Serie A requires many more role changes, in-game tactical changes, and formation changes that will also impact the player’s roles and movements.
That said, Zachary Athekame gives the impression of being a very intelligent player who is quick with the ball, has some explosive accelerations and can easily turn the turbo mode on to get past opponents.
He is also a good dribbler, and that helps him a lot near the touchline.
He relies on his high dribbling success rates to advance and contribute in the playmaking phase.
Zachary Athekame proved at Young Boys that he can also be very dangerous thanks to his crosses and key passes, even though he still has a considerable margin for progress if he keeps working hard on making his passing more dangerous.
Zachary Athekame Pizza Chart
The following pizza chart further confirms Athekame’s traits.
It shows that he is very powerful in terms of passing and positioning, and also wins defensive duels relatively frequently compared with other right-backs from the Swiss Super League and other divisions at a similar level, according to our tier system.
Zachary Athekame is a very good defensive right-back who guarantees solid defending on that side.
He has proven on numerous occasions that he is tough to beat in duels, which makes him attractive to AC Milan, who need a defensively solid right-back to guarantee more compactness at the back and concede fewer unnecessary goals than last season.
However, it is important to note that Zachary Athekame still has room for improvement.
Better performance in aerial duels will be necessary for him to be more complete defensively.
Focusing on improving his shooting abilities will also require him to be more involved in attacks and rely not only on passing but also on shooting when possible.
The lack of shooting, especially accurate/dangerous shooting, is not Athekame’s only attacking weakness, as key passing and assist-making cannot be considered his strengths.
Athekame’s overall goal contribution remains poor.
He was only capable of providing three assists and scoring one goal in 43 games, while he scored two goals and provided one assist the season before in 37 matches.
Zachary Athekame is not a very powerful right-back attacking-wise, but he is athletic and defensively solid.
His main strengths are defending, tackling, and progression with the ball.
Zachary Athekame Vs Alexis Saelemaekers
To assess Zachary Athekame’s potential playing time at AC Milan, it is essential to compare him to his rival for the same position, Alexis Saelemaekers.
To do so, I have tried to look at both players’ attacking input from a data analytics perspective to evaluate both players’ playmaking potential and help determine who can be more beneficial to the team.
The first graphic studies both players’ dribbling abilities, analysing their successful dribbling rates in relation to their progressive runs per match.
Zachary Athekame Dribbling Vs Alexis Saelemaekers Dribbling
This dribbling analysis favours Saelemaekers in terms of the number of progressive runs made per game compared to Athekame.
It also shows that Athekame has a much higher dribbling success rate than the Belgian international.
Even though the high dribbling success rate can be related to the inferior level of the defenders in the Swiss Super League compared to the Italian one, Milan should exploit Athekame’s dribbling qualities and push him further to attempt more progressive runs and therefore dribble more as well, given that Zachary Athekame has the potential to become more dangerous if he increases his progressive runs per match.
Zachary Athekame Assist-Making Vs Alexis Saelemaekers Assist-Making
Apart from dribbling, assessing both players’ playmaking and especially assist-making contribution can be done through the comparison of their xA and accurate passes to the final third per match.
These two stats go together because they determine the potential expected number of assists per match while measuring the accuracy of their progressive passes to the dangerous area (the final third).
In this regard, we can confirm that Saelemaekers is more efficient in both assist-making and passes to the final third.
At the same time, Athekame is not so distant as he provides 62.8% accurate passes to the final third per game.
Zachary Athekame Vs Alexis Saelemaekers Radar Comparison
Overall, Saelemaekers’ playmaking attributes and attacking contribution are still better than Zachary Athekame’s.
Yet, the latter has a lot of potential to develop and improve his playmaking abilities since he has the dribbling abilities and the pace needed to become much more crucial upfront.
The following general radar comparison between the two players confirms that Saelemaekers was better than Zachary Athekame in almost every aspect last season.
AC Milan are already aware of this and plan on working with Athekame to reach and maybe exceed Saelemaekers’ level while playing at Milan, since his level enables him to play in Serie A, knowing that Saelemaekers came from the Belgian Pro League with almost a similar level and did well at Milan.
Zachary Athekame Vs Alexis Saelemaekers Defensive Contribution
Defensively, we cannot argue that Saelemaekers is the best example of a defensive right-back.
Yet, he has always been a very disciplined player, especially during defensive transitions and when covering for his teammates.
He usually uses his pace to catch opponents and apply intensified marking throughout the games he plays, making a significant defensive contribution each game.
His interceptions are also very useful as he often creates counter-attacking opportunities for his team.
That said, Zachary Athekame can be considered a more crucial defensive right-back mainly because he is more solid and powerful physically.
In addition to his remarkable acceleration abilities, which enable him to keep up with most wingers, he is characterised by strong physical abilities in one-on-one defensive duels.
Furthermore, he has been crucial so far with the usage of sliding tackles.
Zachary Athekame is excellent in terms of sliding tackles.
He uses them often in complicated situations and with impeccable efficiency, which makes him even more powerful defensively.
Being able to time his tackles well and intercept the ball from dangerous opponents without committing unnecessary fouls helped him achieve an excellent average success rate of 63.3% in sliding tackles.
If we compare him to Saelemaekers, we find that Athekame is more crucial and efficient with sliding tackles, as Saelemaekers has a success rate of 58.8%, attempting an average of 0.57 tackles per game. In contrast, Athekame’s average reaches 0.9 tackles per game.
Zachary Athekame Vs Alexis Saelemaekers Defensive Abilities
To further evaluate both players’ defensive contributions, the following data analysis graphic studies their average defensive duels won in relation to the number of interceptions they succeed in per game, based on last season’s numbers.
This graphic highlights Athekame’s superiority over Saelemaekers from a defensive perspective.
He is way better at winning defensive duels and making more successful interceptions per game.
Allegri greatly values such defensive attributes and would help both players improve their defensive attributes.
At the same time, Athekame’s defensive superiority would certainly convince Allegri to give his potential new recruit playing time and help him develop his playmaking and goalscoring abilities.
Allegri prefers defensive players who are excellent in the defensive phase and make a margin of progress attacking-wise, rather than defensive players who are poor in terms of defensive contribution and are skilful upfront.
Conclusion
Based on his defensive traits, Zachary Athekame will undoubtedly get his chance at Milan should this deal go through.
He will need to convince Allegri that he can become even better attacking-wise by working hard to improve his shooting and passing abilities.
Having the dribbling skills and ball progression abilities needed to become a more dangerous right-back will certainly help the player become more useful in the opponent’s half.
The key to success at Milan will be to preserve his defensive traits despite having to play against tougher opponents and work hard to enhance his attacking input.
He deserves more playing time over the talented Saelemaekers, who is better upfront but not really more powerful defensively.
Athekame will also need to pay attention to his progress and continuous improvement, as the competition within the team is always challenging.
If Allegri notices a drop in his performances, players like Jiménez and Musah can become the plan B choice for that position instead of him.
It is even probable that someone like Jiménez would get playing time over Zachary Athekame, especially when Estupiñán is fit and performing well, so a move to Milan will require a lot of work from the right-back if he is to succeed.
