In a glittering attacking effort Wednesday night against Southampton, it was Noni Madueke who perhaps shone brightest, with a lovely goal and a heads-up assist to his name. The 22-year-old winger now has five league goals to his name, matching his entire total from last season already. He’s surely well on his way to his first ever (be it here or in the Eredivisie) double-digit scoring campaign.
But when we look just a little bit closer, we find that those numbers have come in bunches. That hat-trick against Wolves was on his very first Premier League appearance of the season, over three months ago! His two assists have come in his last two appearances. When he’s hot, he’s hot — the fire to Cole Palmer’s ice, as he put it — but when he’s not, he’s not.
And that sort of inconsistency apparently extends to the training ground as well, much to manager Enzo Maresca’s frustration.
“With Noni, I have personal relation in terms of he can do much more. He can do much more. The moment he starts to score or assist and is happy, he starts to drop a little bit and the reason why he was not playing [against Aston Villa] is because I do not like the way he trained.
“He has to understand that he has to train every day good. He has to be ambitious. He scored one tonight, he has to go for the second one and the third one. He has to give more assists.
“But overall, he is doing great, he is doing fantastic. He is doing even better in terms of numbers. Noni has to understand he has to work more because he can be much, much, much better.”
Wednesday’s response was indeed much better, but now of course the challenge is to keep it going. Maresca gave Madueke a much longer leash than many other observers might have, but we have plenty of options on the wing to ensure that no one gets a free ride.
“There are players in behind that are ready. We have four wingers that are all very good [and] in the moment one of them drops for whatever reason, there is one in behind that is ready. Noni is not allowed to drop because Pedro is there and doing fantastic. If Pedro drops then Noni is there. The same thing on the other side. This is what they have to understand if we want to be there or be close for something important.”
-Enzo Maresca; source: Football.London
It’s a classic gambit from Maresca, putting the pressure on publicly to motivate Madueke to work and reach his potential. (Being able to do so from a winning position is always helpful.)
If it pays off, it could be legendary.