Another goal for Aston Villa's Jhon Duran takes his total for the season to 7, despite barely starting a game for his club. But with the pressure mounting for Unai Emery to work him into his system, Adam Clery takes a look at just what makes him such a special player and why, ironically, that might be what's keeping him out of the starting XI.
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00:00Hello everybody, Adam Cleary here from 442 and today we're going to talk about John Duran
00:09from Aston Villa, who is a player that I really, really like because I used to be convinced
00:15in my head that that is how you spell John up until the age of like 30.
00:22He is a goal scoring machine, a certifiable bagsman as the internet might call him, and
00:27I've been wanting to do a video on him for a while about why he is so good, but why also
00:33that kind of so good that he is means he doesn't often start for Aston Villa.
00:39Was that English?
00:40All right, so first, tickets to the live show, I told you they would sell out, they have
00:46sold out, so thank you very much for that, and the shirts for the 30th birthday, these
00:49beautiful, beautiful things, there are still some of those left, sizes small to extra,
00:53extra large, so buy one, I'll tell you more about them later.
00:57Now, to properly explain the whole John Duran thing, we need to give you an Arsene Wenger
01:02quote from like 10 years ago, and if you're sitting there going, what, no man, I'm not
01:07here for any of that, I just want to hear about how he's banging all of these worldies,
01:11not like that, and Villa's system and stuff, we will, I promise, we'll get to that, I just
01:16need to go on this tangent to give you the proper context.
01:20So back in 2015, Wenger says, if you look across, I can't do his voice, if you look
01:25across Europe and the world of football, then South America is the only continent to develop
01:29strikers today.
01:30If you look across Europe, where are the strikers from?
01:33You will see that many of them, at least 80% come from South America.
01:36Now, thanks to the dutiful research of Reddit user Elton John's Ballbag, I'm not making
01:42that up, he actually fact-checked that 80% claim, and it's not right.
01:46If you looked at like the top 7 leagues in Europe and then got the top 10 strikers from
01:50all those 7 leagues, you get 70 players, and only 19 of them were South American, which,
01:56and I really should have done the math before I came in here, is like somewhere between
01:5925 and 30%, certainly not 80.
02:02But now, let's take a look at last season in the Premier League, right, the top 10 scorers,
02:06and there were no South Americans there.
02:08In La Liga, it was just Vinicius Junior, in Serie A, it was MartÃnez, Dybala and Zapata,
02:14there was none in Ligue 1, there was none in the Bundesliga, and John de Cadiz and Evan
02:18Nielsen in the Portuguese League.
02:20So that 19 is now down to like 6.
02:24But woah woah woah woah woah, back up a second Adam, didn't you say this Wenger quote was
02:27like important, and he was right, this sounds more like a flop era for South American forwards
02:33for me, like 19 down to like 6, that's absolutely crap.
02:37But if we just zone in on the Premier League's top 10 scorers last season, right, what jumps
02:42out at you?
02:43King Harland is a pure, pure goalscorer, he's a freak in fact, and Alexander Isak, he's
02:49also like 90% focused on finishing chances, very rarely gets involved in much else.
02:55But every other player is either some kind of like specialist forward, or not even one
03:00at all.
03:01Cole Palmer's an attacking midfielder that everything good about Chelsea has to go through,
03:05Phil Foden's a floating creative type, he plays left, right and centre, Dom Solanke's
03:09probably the best pressing forward in the league last year, constantly working off
03:14the ball to turn things over, Olly Watkins is a tactical linchpin of Emery's system,
03:19he got nearly as many assists last year as he did goals, Salah is a wide forward who's
03:24great on the attack but also has to protect his fullback, Son is a wide forward who was
03:28great on the attack but also has to protect his fullback, and Jarrod Bowen is a wide forward,
03:34you get the idea.
03:35There are only two pure, pure centre forwards in that list, and neither of them come from
03:41a country that has one of Europe's big leagues in them.
03:44And then if we go back to La Liga, you've got Ukraine, Norway, Poland, Croatia, Morocco,
03:50in Serie A it's Serbia, Nigeria, Iceland, Belgium, Turkey, in France it's Canada, Gabon,
03:57Georgia, Nigeria, in the Bundesliga it's Belgium, Guinea, Bosnia, Nigeria, Croatia, Portugal's
04:03got Sweden and Congo, and just to get the idea here, right, in the leagues of Europe's
04:08biggest footballing nations, virtually none of the strikers are from those nations.
04:15And that's what Wenger was getting at with that quote, like he was wrong about the South
04:19American thing specifically, but the overall point was that these big leagues in Europe,
04:24these big footballing nations, aren't really creating strikers.
04:28And in fact, if you go back and look at England specifically, what they tend to do is they
04:32train the striker out of their centre forwards.
04:35Like there's so much work done now on positional play, on your link-ups, on your tactical flexibility,
04:42on understanding space, on being a good presser, on playing false nines, there's very little
04:47done on just being a proper, proper striker.
04:49They want them to be more than that, I guess, but in a way, that actually makes them a bit
04:55less.
04:56But that brings us, and thank you for sticking with me during all of that, to John Duran.
05:01He's not more than a striker, he is pure, uncut, $80 million street value, goal-scoring
05:10brilliance.
05:11You look at his numbers over the last year, his chance conversion rate and his goals per
05:15minute are astonishing.
05:17And this stat here, his goals per 90 minutes, doesn't just put him in the top 1% of the
05:22Premier League, that's the top 1% across all of Europe over the last 365 days.
05:28And even here, when you allow other players to have their assists count towards this,
05:34he's still in the top 3%, despite having zero assists.
05:40And the main reason for that is because he has not had these instincts coached out of
05:45him.
05:46He retains some of just the best goal-scoring impulses you could ever hope to see.
05:49You can look at almost any goal he scores for Aston Villa and find something in there
05:53that just is not teachable.
05:56And in the Bologna game, which is what inspired me to do this video, it's this pinning of
06:00the central defender.
06:01Now we'll pause it just as Rodgers puts the cross in, this is where it's going to land.
06:05Now if Duran does what you teach centre-forwards to do, get a bit of separation, drop half
06:10a yard away and then try to run in front, the defender's going to beat him to it.
06:15He's that side, he won't let him run across him, he'll just grab again.
06:18Or more likely, just clear it, because it's right where he is.
06:22So instead, what Duran does is he just holds him and he drags him the yards required to
06:27get himself a little bit of leverage in the space to get the shot.
06:31Like genuinely, you would never, ever coach that.
06:34Because it's just such a rare scenario that in all likelihood, you probably wouldn't win
06:39or you'd be really likely to foul the defender.
06:42It's just, it's not something anyone's ever going to tell you to do, you just have to
06:46think to do it.
06:47And then the finish as well, you can see by how much further around he hooks his leg,
06:51he's going for that side, which again, instinctively.
06:5599% of forwards would just want to get any sort of contact on that and hope it's too
06:59close for the goalie to react.
07:01Like how many times have you seen a chance like this go here because it's just stick
07:06a foot higher and hope for the best, but not when it comes to Duran.
07:09His brain is different.
07:11Now for his long ranges as well, it's also a combination of incredible ball striking
07:15combined with the fact that he just actually tries them.
07:19This little stat that the Premier League published shows that long range efforts have been more
07:23or less consistently declining very steadily since the turn of the millennium.
07:27Like we were getting 13.3 a game in 2003, 2004.
07:31And now 20 years later, we are down to nearly half that.
07:35But again, if you go back to Duran's stats and you look at his average shot range, the
07:38reason he scores so low is because that's kind of backwards.
07:42That's a low score because it's a, it's a high number.
07:45And just think about it this way, right?
07:46If your average shot distance is like 15, 16 yards, then that means for every single
07:52effort you're trying to toe poke from around about six yards out, you're also having another
07:56one that you're trying to wellie from like 27, 28 yards.
08:01My actual favorite bit of his stats though, is all the physicality stuff like the tackles,
08:06the blocks, the clearances, the aerials.
08:08When he's not particularly effectively used in Villa's system, which we're going to get
08:12onto.
08:13So he's not doing like a defensive forward role.
08:14He just throws himself into situations as the ball's in the air.
08:18He tries to win it.
08:19If the ball's loose, he tries to win it back.
08:21Like it is unrefined sort of physical carnage, but he's a unit and it helps him score goals.
08:29The best asset he's got though, other than the absolute cannon of a left foot, right,
08:33is his movement.
08:34Like he's constantly working off the ball, constantly getting into different positions
08:38to give himself the best possible opportunity to score a goal.
08:43Like if you look at this goal here, modern forward coaching tells you to continue this
08:47run forward, to push the defense back, to leave the room in behind.
08:51So if that cutback comes, somebody can get in there and they've got a better chance of
08:54scoring than you have.
08:56But Duran's like, no, because if I make that run and make that space, then I'm not in it.
09:02And I need to be in it if I'm going to score.
09:03So what's the point?
09:04He's not asked about decoy runs.
09:06He's not asked about making space for others.
09:08He's not asked about holding it up and waiting for the support.
09:10He's just trying to score goals.
09:13It's just like single mindedness as an art form.
09:16And this is my favourite, favourite, favourite, favourite John Duran goal, right?
09:20No centre forward now with correct coaching would think about taking a shot on here.
09:25This is sort of an option and maybe this is an option.
09:28And what you should do with his back to goal is hold it and wait for things to sort of open up.
09:33He thinks, no, I'm really good at just smashing it.
09:36So I'm just going to smash it.
09:38Liverpool goal as well.
09:40This is an immediate drop and go option if he keeps a hold of it,
09:43because he's worried about Van Dijk, which he should be.
09:46There's an overlap to roll it off into.
09:48Then he can spin.
09:49But instead, he decides, I'll get it under control and see if I can shoot.
09:53And even when he does get it under control and opens up the shot,
09:56this is an option for him.
09:58And this is an option for him, arguably better than the shot.
10:01And Callum Chambers, he wants to go because he's possibly in a better shooting position on his right foot.
10:07But no, no, not John Duran.
10:10Those three players don't exist.
10:12He just hits it and it goes in.
10:14But of course, then if you look at his passing numbers, they are pathetic.
10:19Like zero assists in the last year.
10:21Virtually no passes into the penalty area.
10:25Not one tiny thought in his head about putting a teammate in.
10:28If he is in the sort of position where a pass would lead to somebody having a great chance,
10:33then he knows that he's already got a good one.
10:350.04 expected assists per 90, right?
10:39And just to do some maths for you, right?
10:42With those numbers, if John Duran played every minute of every game for Aston Villa in the Premier League,
10:48it would take him 25 games to get one assist.
10:53But of course, that doesn't matter because this is his goal scoring rate.
10:57And just to math that in the exact same way, in the time it would take John Duran to get that one assist,
11:04do you know how many goals he would score?
11:0542, thereabouts.
11:08And obviously it doesn't work that way.
11:09It's just data.
11:10And if he did play every game, it wouldn't be like that in real life.
11:12But his current conversion rate, based on the minute he's playing,
11:16he would score 42 goals to every one assist.
11:21I love that.
11:22So then, Aston Villa have got on their hands one of just the most lethal finishers of a footing ball in the world.
11:28Why does he not start more?
11:30Do they not want those 42 goals?
11:32Well, my dear friends and possibly one day lovers, I wouldn't rule anything out.
11:37The reason I gave you that Arsene Wenger quote is because there is a reason that is happening.
11:42None of the major footballing nations are coaching their strikers to play like a John Duran
11:46because the game is now so much more structured and system based.
11:51Olly Watkins is an excellent, excellent finisher.
11:54On his day, the equal of Duran, I would argue,
11:56but he plays a far more important role than just scoring goals.
12:00Like Villa this season have been set up in this sort of 4-2-3-1 shape,
12:03but as with most 4-2-3-1s in the league,
12:05that is sort of their out of possession, just getting started.
12:09What they want to be in eventually is something far more dynamic and exciting.
12:13And that tends, largely anyway, when they're in possession to be this 3-2-5.
12:17But to get into that, Olly Watkins has a really, really important role.
12:20He's constantly running off the ball to drag opposition defenders out of various positions
12:26to allow any of these four players to start to fill them.
12:30Like particularly this season, he's been doing loads of central running
12:33to push the centre backs back and drag defensive midfielders with him,
12:37which is why Morgan Rodgers has looked really good.
12:38He's been dribbling the ball through those spaces created by Watkins.
12:42Basically, the simplest way to think of it is that Olly Watkins is constantly thinking
12:46about his position and his movement relative to all of his teammates,
12:50whereas John Duran will be thinking about his position and his movement
12:53relative to the ball and the goal.
12:55I'll give you a bit of a weird example, right,
12:57because I thought Villa were good against Bologna, totally deserved to win that game,
13:00but I wouldn't have said they were at their fluid best, right?
13:03And Don Duran's impression of link-up play looked like this.
13:08So this is his heat map and you see a big splodge here, right?
13:11And that's because he kept dropping into this area, just with his back to goal all the time,
13:16getting the ball and then laying it off right here to Morgan Rodgers
13:20before turning and sprinting into the box.
13:23He did this, I think, five times, the exact same repetition of movement,
13:28because to him, that's what link-up play is.
13:31I'll come short and I'll get the ball, but because you're in a good position,
13:34I'll give it to you straight away, then I'll just run at the goal and you can find me.
13:38Now, on the one hand, that is just terrible, terrible combination work,
13:42but on the other, it does show that he is learning this side of the game,
13:46that he recognises he's going to start having to add a few extra strings to his bow,
13:50despite, you know, that never having come up before.
13:53And it really hasn't. Like, Duran spent his entire adolescence
13:56and all of his development in Colombia, in South America,
14:00where they would have thought it was great that he was just banging in all of these chances.
14:03And then when he was like 18, he moved to MLS.
14:06Do you think any of the coaches at Chicago Fire were going to look at somebody
14:12who was already rated as one of the best young players in the world
14:15and would have said, oh, hey, listen, buddy,
14:18you're going to have to learn how to play false nine.
14:22No, I don't. I don't. I don't think that would have happened.
14:25I think they would have just let him do whatever he liked.
14:29So, yeah, that is just like a little video on John Duran and Aston Villa.
14:33The reason it feels like you're watching something incredibly special
14:37when he plays is because these days you are.
14:40And I've got no doubt whatsoever that Unai Emery being the terrific,
14:43fantastic coach and developer of footballers that he is,
14:47will make him a more complete, well-rounded centre forward.
14:50But also, I think he shouldn't.
14:53Better coaching will undoubtedly make him a better all-round centre forward,
14:58but I don't want that. I don't want him to be a better all-round centre forward.
15:02I just want him to be just a really aggy, hammer it every chance I get striker.
15:07But they grow up so quick, don't they?
15:10Anyway, yes, if you enjoyed that, I did seem to have a lot of notes for that,
15:13but I can't remember making a lot of points.
15:15But please do subscribe to us here at 442 on YouTube.
15:17We try and cover as many teams and as fun players and all the things
15:20everybody's talking about as we possibly can.
15:23You can get me across all the social medias, Adam Cleary, C-L-E-R-Y.
15:26I have something of a personal nature, very fun, that I'm going to unveil soon.
15:30So if you don't want to miss that, you should follow me on things.
15:33The 442 shirt is there in the corner of the video.
15:35The anniversary shirt, the greatest football kit you've ever seen.
15:39That is still on sale.
15:41We've got a couple of those left.
15:43They will, in my opinion, be worth in the future one million pounds.
15:48So you might want to invest.
15:56No doubt somebody illegal would have thrown a disclaimer in after I've said that.
16:00And yeah, fair, I guess.
16:04Bye.