decent shout tbf
former jersey numbers available..
13 Nîmes Olympique 19/20
22 AS Béziers 18/19
35 Nîmes Olympique 16/17
VERY DECENT SHOUT!
Cercle Brugge has been one of the sensations of the start of the current season in Belgium´s Jupiler Pro league, giving continuity to his great sports project during the last years, obtaining better positions each season and consolidating as a referent squad in his national league. They have organized a quite young and promising squad, who is giving an incredible output and catching up attention around Europe. One of his main attractions is his attacking reference, Kévin Denkey, who is even ameliorating his last year's incredible form.
Despite being born 30/11/2000 in Togo, Kévin Denke has made it to the elite of football growing up in France, being a Nimes academy product. After playing on loan for Breziers, and not having many minutes in Nimes first squad, he was transferred to Cercle Brugge, where at his fourth season is showing his best level, having contributed already to 11 goals on his 15 matches played, making it his best ever start of a season and co-leather of Jupiler Pro League goalscoring table, tied with Koita.
Denkey is a complete striker profile, versatile to adapt to different roles. He mainly performs as center forward, but can play next to the side line as winger, preferably in the right side, as he possesses verticality and ability to unbalance and open up defenses. He is a physical and clever player, with a huge goalscoring nose and adaptability to different attacking systems.
When talking about a striker, his goal scoring efficiency is mainly the most important attribute. In that aspect, Kévin Denkey is overperforming, having converted 2,4 goals more than expected, which talks about his quality of finishing. He is the kind of striker with the goal between his eyebrows, averaging a total of 3,52 shots per match, which despite having a low percentage on target (31,7%), has a good scoring ratio, of half of his shots on target. As mentioned, he possesses good finishing but many times lacks good shooting selection and decision making in terms of position, which explains that low accuracy on shooting, as well as his not much developed finishing with his weak foot. He is a clever forward inside and near the penalty area. He looks for defenders blind spots, shifts directions and makes good diagonal moves and body faints to separate himself from defenders, losing their mark and obtaining good spots out of pressure, having scored 10 out of his 11 goals from inside the penalty area. He possesses good first touch finishing and also aerial finishing accuracy, being predominant the power on his finishing instead of colocation quality shots.
Not only is he a good finishing striker, as he provides many more alternatives to the game of his team. Denkey is a forward who despite becoming much more determinant in advanced areas, loves to come down to receive and be involved in the link up play of his team. He is a reliable and solid player when holding the ball with the back to the goal, dragging defenders out of position and creating time and space for teammates to attack to the back of the defensive line, providing his physicality good ball protection to operate in those actions. Whereas he performs well in those situations, he is not reliable at all when trying to combine and associate when helping in the build up phase. He possesses a passing percentage of 68, playing mainly short range passes, numbers that need to improve, as well as his first touch, many times imprecise and making him lose advantage. He is an interesting alternative for playing with the back to the goal, but also into open space. Being fast and strong, he is clever to fix defenses and attack their back, enlarging rival´s defensive proposals and allowing his mates to operate in inside positions with bigger space and translate into attack directly. He uses his body well, don´t being afraid of contact situations to compete those dead balls played by long throws and regain attacking sequences for his team. When receiving with space, Denkey is a lethal player, not hesitating to try to surpass rivals in individual situations, showing huge ease of manner. He is not a really technical player with amazing skills and enjoyable tricks, but is effective in his runs, having powerful ball carry and exploding his athletic change of pass and directions.
Apart from his great contribution in the attacking phase, Denkey is a committed player off the ball, having great sacrifice and work rate. He usually tracks back to establish a medium block and support midfield, making the majority of his tackles in the middle third. Despite that commitment, he lacks aggression in that defensive block as well as poor technique in tackling, not being as determinant as his attitude towards defending. Where he does make the difference is when on pressing. He selects great moments to jump on pressure and fastly harass rivals in possession of the ball, provided by good game lecture, which also allows him to block passing lanes and avoid rival team progression with intelligent curved runs.
Kévin Denkey is a young and promising attacker who despite having room for improvement (technically and in his finishing) is giving flashes of the great player he can become, seeming to be ready for a move to tier 1 teams. In that sense, he reminds me in play and situation to Victor Boniface, the Bayern Leverkusen player who is having an incredible impact in Bundesliga after having an incredible season last year playing in Belgian first division.
Scouting Report
Tactical Analysis
