Thomas Mangani: ‘A lot of motivation’ – why 35 y/o maestro could prove a clever catch for Ajaccio – scout report

Olivier Pantaloni led his long-time club, Ajaccio, to Ligue 1 in 2021/22 as L’ours achieved a second-place finish in Ligue 2 to return to the top flight — where they’ll face the likes of PSG, Lyon, Lille, Marseille and Monaco — for the first time since 2013/14 when they were last relegated from Ligue 1. They achieved promotion this past season while boasting the best defensive record in France’s second tier. Ajaccio conceded just 19 goals during 2021/22, a staggering ratio of just one goal every two games.

Of course, life will be more difficult next season and they need to get their summer recruitment right, first and foremost, if they’re to survive in Ligue 1 next term. In our view, they’ve gotten off to a great start, in that regard, by signing a midfielder with vast experience in the top flight, Thomas Mangani (183cm/603, 79kg/174lbs) on a free after the 35-year-old ended his seven-year stint at Angers at the end of the 2021/22 season, with his Angers tenure beginning back in 2015 when he joined from then-Serie A side Chievo Verona — a club for which he made just one league appearance, that coming against Juventus. While the early-to-middle part of his career was difficult, Mangani has truly established himself as worthy of playing in one of Europe’s best leagues in the mid-to-latter stage of his career.

Mangani joins Ajaccio, where he spent the 2007/08 season on loan from Monaco, off the back of an impressive campaign in which he appeared in 33 of Angers’ Ligue 1 games, scoring seven goals and providing two assists. This was the most prolific season of the 35-year-old’s career in front of goal and he played a key role in Gérald Baticle’s side despite his age. We feel he can continue to play a key role in France’s top flight for newly-promoted Ajaccio next season and this tactical analysis and scout report aims to explain why via analysis of Mangani in the 2021/22 campaign as well as by making some points on Ajaccio’s strategy and tactics to discuss what we believe their plans for their new midfielder may be.

Could this prove to be a decisive transfer in Ligue 1’s relegation battle next season? Only time will tell, really, if the midfielder lives up to his recent claims that he’s joining Ajaccio “with a lot of motivation”, but we certainly feel Mangani has the potential to be a massive difference-maker for Ajaccio at the lower end of the table. All stats and data used in this analysis come from Wyscout unless otherwise stated.

Defensive qualities

Adam Scully analysed Ajaccio and their defensive tactics for Total Football Analysis earlier this year and I’d highly recommend reading that piece to fill yourself in on the relevant details regarding how Mangani’s new team liked to defend in 2021/22. Ajaccio tend to defend in a 4-4-2 mid-block, primarily, using specific pressing triggers as cues to jump into a more aggressive press. For the most part, however, they’re not incredibly aggressive, firstly prioritising organisation in their 4-4-2 and waiting for the opposition to give them a chance to win the ball back.

I believe this kind of defensive system would suit Mangani down to the ground. At 35, as you might imagine, he’s not really a guy who you’ll typically see charging around the middle of the park pressing with great intensity and relying on his physical traits. Instead, Mangani relies on his positioning and ability to read the game, first and foremost.

Don’t take this to mean Mangani doesn’t offer a lot without the ball — he absolutely does. The midfielder made an impressive 9.72 successful defensive actions per 90 this season, ranking highly among Ligue 1 midfielders for that particular metric. He made a lot of interceptions (4.88 per 90) and engaged in 7.74 defensive duels per 90, though only managed a below-average 59% defensive duel success rate, which he probably won’t be overly pleased with. We’ll discuss more on that later but firstly, let’s look at Mangani’s interception-making ability, which is highly impressive.

Figures 1-2 look at Mangani’s interception-making ability. Starting with figure 1, here we see the opposition on the ball just entering the middle third of the pitch, having gotten through Angers’ first line of pressure. This left Mangani and his two midfield partners on either side of him to protect the middle of the park and prevent the opposition from easily cutting through them again.

We see Mangani circled in figure 1. In this game, he played as the central — and deepest — midfielder in Angers’ 3-5-2 system. The left-footed deep-lying playmaker generally operated as either the central midfielder or the left central midfielder in this system, most of the time, operating as the former.

In figur