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With the season having ended, Sportskeeda decided to let its viewers rate the 30 best players of the season.
We will be shortlisting 30 of the best performers this term, and let you pick your winner.
What do you think? Have your say at the end of the article.
In day and age when football transfer market is at its height of inflation, when young sensations cost more than the rest of the team and when defensive midfielders command transfer fees of around € 40 million, logic says a €4 million bargain signing shouldn’t really be discussed as a possible player of the year. But that is exactly what Ilkay Gundogan has managed to achieve through his exceptional yet under-the-radar performances in his two seasons at Dortmund.
The Rising:
His progress since arriving at the Westfalenstadion from Nurnberg has been extraordinary to say the least. After struggling initially at the club, looking just a pale shadow of Nuri Sahin, whom he was brought on to replace, he has gone on to become the fulcrum of the Dortmund midfield. Die Schwarzgelben are simply not the same without him and hold an appalling record without the German international gracing the centre of the park with his hard work and superb range of passing.
Even though in the later part of his first season at Dortmund, he showed signs of improvement and moments of magic like the unforgettable 120th minute winner in the 2011-12 DFB Cup semi final, the 2012-13 season was the real break-through season for ‘Illy’ as he is popularly called. He matured into a truly outstanding central midfielder, bossing the midfield like a seasoned veteran; interestingly, keeping the real veteran and club captain Sebastian Kehl out of the starting XI. He has given the team a new dimension altogether with his energy and attacking forays facilitating Dortmund’s ‘busy’ brand of football.
The ‘misleading’ statistics:
Gundogan amassed ‘just’ 4 goals and 3 assists in the season playing for club in all competitions. Combine the international games he featured in during the course of the season and only another two assists and a goal will get added to the list. Clearly a failure, ‘statistically’, considering he played in 50 matches in total.
But it is the other ‘less discussed and highlighted’ numbers which show his worth. 86% pass completion rate, 1,915 passes completed this season (averaging about 59 passes a match). A tackle success rate of more than 75 percent. Jürgen Klopp’s 4-2-3-1 focuses heavily on short passing and this element of passing is Gündogan’s bread and butter, compromising nearly 90% of the passes. Equally good in long passing, he averaged 6.2 completed longballs a match – one of the best rates in the Bundesliga.
Illy’s game and his position in the team formation is such that he invariably plays ‘the pass before the key pass’. This renders his un-glamorous game as one that can be easily overlooked. The game of Ice Hockey has a concept of ‘second assist’ – the last player to pass the puck (the ice hockey substitute for a ball) to the goal scorer gets the primary assist and the player who passed it to the primary assister gets the secondary assist. I don’t have the exact stats to support this but if such a ‘second assist’ system was in place in football, Gundogan would have been in the top five in that category.
It was perhaps destined that Gundogan won’t make headlines this season. In what was perhaps one of the best midfield displays by any player in the Champions League this season, Gundogan ruled the middle of the park against Real Madrid and their midfield maestros. He was extremely impressive as a pivot as he was ever available to receive possession, which he inevitably used in a sensible manner. His range of passing and consistently reading his team-mates’ runs created chances after chances. It was a truly indefatigable display only to be over-shadowed by Lewandowski’s four goals which stole media headlines all over the world.
Sometimes it was the position he plays in, sometimes it was his team-mates, the other times it was the transfer stories and the returning players but every reason worked against him getting the media spotlight, the headlines his performances deserved. It can be said he had one of those seasons where for some reason, he was not eventful enough to be on the media radar.
The ‘contradictory’ measures of success:
A crowd favorite at Dortmund, Gundogan was born and bred in Gelsenkirchen, the neighbouring city and home of fierce rivals FC Schalke 04 and was also a supporter of the ‘Royal Blues’ in his childhood. He even spent a season at Schalke early in his youth career. This makes his current status as one of the favourites of Dortmund all the more miraculous.
In the summer of 2011, local hero and star of Dortmund’s midfield, Nuri Sahin left the German shores to join the mighty Real Madrid side. Ilkay was brought in from Nurnberg to replace Sahin. Struggling in the first half of the season to fill Sahin’s boots, Ilkay improved in such huge leaps and bounds that when Sahin came back to Dortmund on loan in January this year, Dortmund critics and experts began to wonder if Sahin will ever become Gundogan’s equal.
His significance:
The modest stats for the season tend to downplay the irreplaceable passing game he plays; his ability to remain calm in difficult situations, to break up opponent’s attacks by his timely tackles and reading of the game and his consistency of accurate distribution of the ball from the midfield. To judge his true worth, one has to ‘read between the lines’ while analysing the team’s performance without him. Dortmund’s failure to win any of the six league matches he did not feature in shows his value as the hub of the team.
His performances also seem to have impressed Germany coach Joachim Low, who after his side’s victory against Kazakhstan this march said: “He (Gundogan) has made great strides, not only in Dortmund, but also with us. He’s got all the potential to become (a) world-class player“
In the past year he has grown and progressed and has emerged as a cornerstone of Dortmund’s play making me sound a bit less crazy to suggest him as the player of the season ahead of his team-mates – the goal machine Robert Lewandowski and the creative genius Mario Gotze .
Of course he can’t be the direct replacement but still his displays this term some what softens the blow of Mario Gotze leaving Dortmund this summer.
Click here to view the rest of the Player of the Season nominees
