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#2 Dries Mertens
Mertens has made a seamless transition into a striker
When Napoli lost their star striker Gonzalo Higuain to Juventus last summer, they had a huge void to fill and hence they signed Arkadiusz Milik from Ajax as a potential replacement. However, Milik suffered a ligament injury after making a bright start to life in Italy.
With Milik out, Napoli needed a striker to lead their potent lineup and up stepped Dries Mertens. Now Mertens is a terrific player, but he was never a striker. He has predominantly played as a winger or as an attacking midfielder his entire career before that.
He finished the 2016/17 season with 28 league goals and 9 assists in 35 games and narrowly missed out on the Serie Golden boot by just one goal, In all competitions, he scored 34 times in 45 games.
Mertens carried on as Napoli’s striker this season also and has so far racked up 9 goals in 14 games.
Milik’s injury turned out to be a blessing in disguise, otherwise, we may never have had the chance to see the striker Dries Mertens can be.
