In this article, @Allsoppwill checks in on Brentford’s new striker, Ivan Toney.
With a fifth of the season gone, Toney has been prolific so far this season with 9 non-penalty goals from 11 games played. He looks strong in the air, a really hard worker and gets in exactly the right places to score. It seems that he’s taken to the Championship like a duck to water. But how good is Ivan Toney really?
Going by his non-penalty xG (calculated by Infogol), his shots would see an average return of 6.13 goals so far this season - which is quite a bit below his actual output.
This suggests that we might see a bit of a slowdown in his scoring rate over the next few games (to be fair, scoring a brace every game wouldn’t just be exceptional, it would be unbelievable).
Slowdown or not, there are a few things which make me think he will still have an excellent season.
Physicality
Ivan’s second goal against Sheffield Wednesday had just 0.08 xG, that is, an 8% chance of being scored on average. So, was he lucky to score? I think the fact that he scored from that position shows, yes, luck, but also exceptional skill to convert such a chance. It came from a Janelt corner, and Ivan started the move on the edge of the box. He was man-marked by ex-Bee Moses Odubajo.
By the time the Brentford striker makes contact, Ivan and Moses both end up just on the edge of the 6-yard box. Ivan having pushed his marker half the length of the penalty area:
Analysing the individuality of this particular effort, there are multiple reasons behind the low xG rating for this shot. Firstly, the chance is created from a Janelt corner and direct goals from corners are scored at a much lower rate compared to how they are perceived as an exceptional attacking opportunity. Added to the event leading to the shot, if this was a footed attempt at goal created by a shorter pass, due to the central position in the middle of the 6-yard box, this would be a big chance, of at least 0.3-0.4xG. The fact that Ivan gets the shot away given his starting position and the man-marking of Odubajo demonstrates both his strength and skill.
Jockeying your marker back 10 yards is difficult, and I reckon that in seasons gone by (especially with Maupay, who was much less imposing than Toney is), there wouldn’t have even been an attempt on goal. Watkins developed rapidly and added a level of aerial physicality to his game which Ivan is carrying on and even improving on.
In the last 2 seasons, we have added further variety to the side and an under-appreciated aspect of that is the improvements aerially. This allows the side to benefit from qualities usually associated with direct teams.
It’s also important to point out that there’s no way Odubajo should allow himself to be pushed that far back, and that a large portion of the blame for the goal lies squarely with him for not defending well enough. Still, this stood out for me as a great demonstration of Ivan’s strength and physicality when it comes to attacking the goal.
Defence and pressing
Ivan won the second-most aerial challenges of any Bees player in the Sheffield Wednesday game, and is consistently hard-working enough to track back and defend from open play. The same qualities which made his second goal in that game make him hard to attack against. He is strong and tall, with a good ability to direct his headers away from danger just like he directs them towards the net.
Watkins made a name for himself last year for his cross-field sprints and defending from the front. Ivan has again taken on that mantle. His pressing game is excellent, evidenced by this chance-creating challenge against Coventry:
The ball was passed a good couple of metres from him, and he still makes the effort to come off his original defender to challenge for the ball. This carved out an attempt which on another day would have gone in - and his pressing again for the second ball on the rebound of this attempt resulted in him taking a shot which forced a good save from the Coventry ‘keeper. Two chances in the space of 10 seconds, all born of Toney’s ability to press and defend from the front.
At Brentford, under Thomas Frank, defending starts with various events triggering pressing from the front. So if his goals do dry up somewhat, is he still valuable to the team? His defensive capabilities make the answer to this question a resounding yes from me.
Areas to work on
Despite being the second-most prolific scorer in the Championship at the time of writing with 10 goals, I do think Ivan has some areas that he can work on (no doubt the coaching team will be doing just this!).
First of all, with Ollie Watkins starting as a winger and converting himself into a number 9 last year, we essentially had the complete forward player. Owing to his years on the wing, Watkins had an awareness for passing and a quality on the ball which made him able to make driving runs, carrying the ball long distances and then laying it off to a teammate or shooting himself
In Toney’s case, he is a fully-fledged 9 (so why is Marcondes wearing that number? Go figure!) and is therefore much more used to being on the end of a lay-off rather than creating it himself. He is also less in sync with the midfield, because most of his interactions on the pitch come via passes from wingers, not a number 6 or 8.
Having said this, he is absolutely capable of making lay-offs to other players, evidenced by his releasing of Forss to score against Stoke. As indicated by Frank’s attempts to alter the flow of the recent match against Middlesbrough, I think we might see Toney and Forss deployed together as an alternate system to 4-3-3 as the season goes on.
Another important area of our attacking last year was the rotation of the front 3 - as Watkins, Benrahma and Mbeumo swapped places during attacking phases to confuse defenders and make space for passes and shots. I’m not entirely sure that Toney has the same ability to perform these interchanges with wide players just yet - especially with either newcomer Ghoddos or Canos not back to his best on the left hand side.
Because of this we are more likely to go directly to Ivan in the middle. Looking at Ivan’s 10 goals, an incredible 4 of them have been assisted by Bryan Mbeumo’s darting runs down the right hand side. This is an unbelievable stat, as the record for assists-to-goalscorer in the Championship is 8 (Ings and Tripper, Burnley, 13/14). It could be interpreted as an over-reliance on that particular partnership, but as long as they are both fit, the goals look likely to flow.
In short, despite having a few areas to work on before he reaches the heights of Watkins from last year, Ivan Toney has both the offensive and defensive qualities to reassure me that he is going to be a fantastic player for the Bees. Whether it’s his pressing, physicality, or ability defending or attacking set pieces, he is sure to keep scoring and keep making a considerable mark on games.
Unless, of course, the opposition is managed by Neil Warnock. That’s just the rules.
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