SC Freiburg have slowly evolved from a small, local club into a fully-fledged Bundesliga powerhouse.
The club from the Black Forest finished in the top six in three of the last four seasons, qualifying for European football multiple times in a row just a couple of years after being relegated to the 2. Bundesliga in 2015.
But Freiburg aren’t just successful on the pitch; the club has become one of the most financially stable clubs in Germany, allowing their current run to be more than just a short-lived dream.
The key to their success: Their academy and the development of young up-and-coming players.
After young goalkeeper Noah Atubolu struggled in his first couple of starts at the club, former long-time manager Christian Streich told the press that they knew about his struggles, but that they needed to develop him, because that’s what the club is all about.
Multiple players have come through the ranks of the Freiburg academy and first team, just as Atubolu has.
Multiple players in the German national team were developed in the Breisgau, like Oliver Baumann, Matthias Ginter, Nico Schlotterbeck, Robin Koch, and Kevin Schade.
This season, they found another young player bound for a breakthrough campaign: Johan Manzambi, a midfielder from Switzerland.
At just 20 years of age, Manzambi has become a regular for Julian Schuster’s team, playing on the international stage, making his debut for the Swiss national team, and attracting interest from clubs like SSC Napoli and Paris Saint-Germain.
In this tactical analysis and scout report, we will look at what makes Johan Manzambi so special, the strengths and weaknesses the young midfielder possesses, and why he is bound to make the World Cup for his home country.
Johan Manzambi In The Attacking Phase
Most of the time, Julian Schuster lines up Johan Manzambi as a central midfielder in his 4-2-3-1 formation.
Still, the young midfielder has such a wide range of movement that limiting him to a single position does him no justice.
Johan Manzambi is everywhere when Freiburg are in possession.
He likes to overload the wings, but he can also be found at the edge of the box or even in a striker position at times.
This makes him incredibly hard to control for the opposing defence, with Johan Manzambi consistently forcing defenders to switch their assignments.
Here is a situation from the game against Mainz 05 last weekend.
Mainz had a player sent off early, so they fell back into a deep block and focused on defending the central areas of the pitch from there on out.
Manzambi often overloaded the left side, receiving the ball out wide and trying to either stretch the deep block or find space to catch it.
Manzambi always has a good body position while receiving.
This time, he positions himself right at the height of the midfield line, ready to move past it with his first touch quickly.
Manzambi dribbles forward and progresses the ball into the space in front of the backline, but still out wide.
He then waits for the runs his teammates provide for him; this time, his attacking midfielder makes a vertical run down the wing to drag away one of the centre-backs.
Manzambi then makes the quick decision to cut inwards, now dribbling horizontally.
He gets in front of the backwards-moving midfielder and shields the ball, allowing him to get to the edge of the box.
The athletic tools of the young Swiss midfielder are off the charts.
Manzambi has elite burst, is fast over longer distances, has excellent coordination and balance, and he’s relatively strong as well.
His size might not be elite, but he makes the most of it, has a very broad build, and uses his body well at all times.
From there on, Manzambi is a huge fan of playing and moving, always trying to get into the box quickly.
Even though he is a midfielder, he has very striker-like tendencies around the box, getting into good positions often and enjoying physical duels there.
Here, Manzambi plays the square pass at the edge of the box towards his open teammate at the right time.
He dribbles right towards the only player who can cover that passing angle, drags him towards the ball, then plays the pass, showing great patience and composure.
After playing the pass, he quickly moves into the box and receives the ball again with a one-two.
From there on, he shows what makes him so special.
The young Swiss international receives the ball between three players, makes a good first touch, and turns towards the goal.
He uses his quick feet to get past the last standing defender and manages to cut inside again to find the open space in the box.
Manzambi’s pace, first touch, and physical style of play when shielding the ball make him a huge threat in the box; he is always able to find or even create space for himself quickly and is incredibly hard to defend.
And he is not only reaching the dangerous areas, but he also knows how to finish effectively.
Despite having major trouble with his body positioning when he gets out of his dribbling, as we can see in the picture above, where his body is turned towards the sideline, and he has to make many movements to adjust, he is a very good finisher.
In this case, he knows the defender will close out the space towards the far-post, because there is a lot of open space there, so Manzambi waits with his shot until the defender stretches out his leg.
This allows for his shot to nutmeg the defender and go in at the near-post, against the direction of the movement of the goalkeeper, and leaving no chance for the shot being saved.
Johan Manzambi initiated and finished the attack beautifully, showcasing everything that makes him so special.
Johan Manzambi As A Striker
While Manzambi is a midfielder, he finds himself in very high positions very often on the pitch, even playing as an additional striker frequently.
He perfectly fits the mould of modern attacking central midfielder; he can push up into the attacking line in a 3-2-5 Guardiola-style of building up.
In this situation in their cup game against SV Darmstadt 98 during the week, Manzambi even plays as the target man for a long ball, going into an attacking duel against the centre-back.
While he is unable to win the aerial duel or secure possession, he creates an opportunity for his teammates to play for the second ball.
After Freiburg secures possession again, Manzambi instantly moves into the box and makes himself able to receive the ball with his back turned towards the goal.
He uses his back to push the centre-back away and holds up play for a second after receiving the ball, allowing his teammates to move into the box as well.
He then uses a well-timed body feint to get a little bit of space between himself and the defender, then uses his great burst to take off and move towards the goal and pass the backline.
Knowing the centre-back will now recover his position towards him, Manzambi quickly takes the foot off the gas, waits for the defender to get close to him, and takes off again, forcing contact and getting a penalty out of it.
His physical playstyle and good hold-up play make Manzambi a threat in the box and around it. He has already scored multiple striker-like goals in his career, and I don’t see that pattern coming to a stop anytime soon.
Johan Manzambi Between The Lines
If we are looking at one of Johan Manzambi’s weaknesses, we have to take a look at his game between the lines.
As an attacking midfielder, he should be able to find open space and play well in the half-spaces, but in his career so far, the young midfielder has had some problems with finding the right timing and body position to shine in these situations.
Here we can see Johan Manzambi drop out of the attacking line in the half-space, trying to build a triangle with his teammates.
His timing is already not ideal, but his positioning is even worse.
He moves right behind the midfielder and is now way too close to receive the ball because of the coverage shadow.
A solution through the triangle is not ideal here either, because the distances are way too low, and the defenders could easily recover their position in the meantime.
Johan Manzambi often has these types of problems, where he tries to find space and receive the ball, but then positions himself in the midfielders’ coverage shadow, making it impossible for him to receive between the lines.
Another issue is his body position; he should at least be in a half-open stance, but instead, he always has his back to the goal, making it hard for him to build momentum between the lines.
The combination of these two problems often leads to losses or, at best, hard duels for the Swiss international, and that is not what you want from your attacking midfielder.
In this situation, he gets bailed out by his teammate, Maximilian Eggestein.
Eggestein dribbles forward diagonally, forcing the midfielder to react to his dribbling and close the distance towards him.
This shifts the coverage shadow a bit, and Eggestein can now thread a pass through the narrow gap between the two defenders, allowing Manzambi to receive the ball between the lines.
Despite receiving, his body position forces him to take a touch away from goal, so the entire situation is still not ideal.
But it put Manzambi in a position to make a play, and once again, the young midfielder showed why big clubs want to sign him as soon as January.
He takes off with elite acceleration, leaving the left-back and the midfielder in the dust, getting into the box untouched.
This forces the left centre-back to step up towards him now and move laterally.
Manzambi was already prepared for that and used another well-timed body feint to cut inside.
The touch wasn’t even that good, and it forces Johan Manzambi into a bad shooting position again, but it doesn’t really matter.
Off-balance, Manzambi turns his hip just enough to get the shot off and blasts it towards the far post, hitting the woodwork and getting a bit unlucky here.
But still, the off-balance shot after the dribble was pretty much impossible to defend, and despite his lacklustre play between the lines, Johan Manzambi managed to create a big opportunity for himself and nearly capitalised on it.
Conclusion
Johan Manzambi has not been a part of the SC Freiburg first team for a very long time, but as things stand, he won’t be there for an extended period of time either.
His physical tools and knack for finding the right space in the box make him an intriguing player for teams looking for an attacking midfielder to provide a spark.
The young Swiss midfielder has a wide range of actions, which allows him to initiate from anywhere on the pitch; his pace is elite, and his ability in the box is a weapon opposing teams must account for.
Johan Manzambi has some struggles between the lines, but I think those are coachable to a degree, and with everything else going for him, he would be a very good signing for a lot of clubs in January.
