Christos Tzolis Scouting Report At PAOK 2020/21 – The Greek Wonder Kid With 17 Goals Who Is Destined For A Big Money Move

Who Is Christos Tzolis?

In the mainstream media, a lot of limelight is shed on top young players who rapidly rise through the academy system and make it in the first team of their respective clubs, particularly in the biggest European teams.

Players such as Ansu Fati at Barcelona, Mason Greenwood at Manchester United, and Bukayo Saka at Arsenal have all experienced meteoric rises, which have been highly publicised within the press, however, there are players at teams in European leagues on the outskirts of the typical top five that have also experienced similar rises.

One of these players is Christos Tzolis who currently plays for PAOK in the Greek Super League 1.

On June 7, following the return from football after the COVID-19 outbreak, Tzolis was handed his debut by the manager at the time, Abel Ferreira, who now manages this season’s Copa Libertadores winners Palmeiras.

Since making his debut roughly 9 months ago, the youngster has scored 18 goals, 17 of which have come this season, and gotten four assists.

Tzolis has also managed to get himself four caps for the Greek national team due to his incredible talent and impressive form, scoring in one of the games.

The 19-year-old has been heavily scouted by some top European clubs including United, Borussia Dortmund, and even Barcelona from a very young age, with a big move likely to happen in the summer.

This will be a tactical analysis article in the form of a Christos Tzolis scout report.

It will be an analysis of how Tzolis fits into the tactics applied by PAOK as well as an overall look at the player’s style of play and greatest qualities.

Christos Tzolis Positioning and style of play

Tzolis is a right-footed wide player, who generally plays on the left for his club and country.

According to PAOK’s official website, Tzolis is 179cm tall, which equates to approximately 5 ft 10 inches, whilst he weighs 73kg, meaning the Greek international is a decent build for a wide player.

His physical attributes mean he does not get shrugged off the ball easily and has good balance when running with the ball at his feet, while also being rather strong aerially.

Tzolis is quite versatile and can play any position across the frontline, although playing on the left is his strongest position.

In all competitions this season, the youngster has started on the left in 64 percent of his games, playing as an inside-forward 29 percent of the time, which is the most in one position.

This is mainly in a 4-2-3-1 formation, which PAOK’s manager Pablo Garcia has deployed in 34 percent of their games all season, whilst the 5-4-1 and the 4-3-3 are the second and third most used systems.

When on the left, Tzolis likes to drift between the left flank and the halfspace, constantly creating combinations and positional interchanges with the fullback as well as position himself in the box quite a lot, which can be seen from his heat map this season.

Tzolis plays more of a second-striker at times rather than a winger, making intelligent runs into the box and getting himself into excellent goalscoring positions just as a striker would.

In terms of creating chances for others, the Greek star is rather lacklustre, boasting an expected assists rate (xA) of just 0.13 per game this season.