A seventh Leeds United goal of the season for Lukas Nmecha came in the FA Cup fourth round.
Dominic Calvert-Lewin remains the front-runner for Leeds United bargain of the summer but his strike partner Lukas Nmecha cannot be far behind.
Leeds paid exactly zero pounds in transfer fees for the pair but their financial commitment towards Calvert-Lewin was much greater. The former Everton man signed a three-year contract as opposed to Nmecha’s two-year deal and is almost certainly among the highest-profile - and highest-paid - squad members.
Calvert-Lewin took ownership of the starting No.9 spot once fitness was built and few in West Yorkshire expected him to maintain such a high level for so long, his 10 Premier League goals a best return since 2020/21. But similarly, few would have predicted Nmecha would prove such a capable goalscorer in reserve.
Sunday’s opening goal at Birmingham City was Nmecha in a nutshell. The build-up was scruffy and it never felt like the Leeds striker had full control of the ball until the moment he steadied himself to belt a finish in at Ryan Allsop’s near-post. He struggled to make the ball stick when it was sent his way during the first-half but when the chance came, he buried it.
“I took my shot and it went in,” he matter-of-factly recalled at full-time, Leeds having eventually won 4-2 on penalties. “Yeah, I think I have got a good finish. I trust myself in those situations and recently it has been working quite well.”
The stats behind Lukas Nmecha’s impressive debut Leeds United campaign
Recently it has been working very well indeed. Nmecha has three goals in his last three appearances across all competitions, finding the net every 52.6 minutes on average during that brief purple patch. But stretch further back and he’s on seven goals in 908 minutes this season, equivalent to 0.69 goals per 90 minutes - Calvert-Lewin is on 0.51.
That average gets even better when looking at the Premier League in isolation, with an average of 0.78 goals per 90 better than the likes of Cole Palmer, Igor Thiago and Hugo Ekitike. Erling Haaland (0.92 goals per 90) has 22 league goals to his name and is one of two players to have played over 600 minutes with a better hit-rate - the other being Bournemouth’s Eli Junior Kroupi at 0.82.
According to Opta, Nmecha’s six Premier League goals have come from 6.31xG which shows the Leeds striker is just about finishing the chances he is expected to. An xG-per-shot average of 0.28 is higher than any other striker to have played 600-plus minutes and suggests an ability to get into good goalscoring positions.
But while a lot of Nmecha’s goals have been from chances you’d expect from a top-level striker to bury - two penalties included - he has also shown an ability to produce some excellent finishes. Sunday’s arrowed effort at Birmingham, for example, had an xG of just 0.05 while an equally clinical effort at Nottingham Forest was recorded at 0.1xG.
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Nmecha is also proving equally capable at affecting games from the start or coming off the bench. He’s scored in five in his last eight starts across all competitions while also netting crucial winners as a late substitute against Everton and Fulham - goals that directly turned two points into six.
The hope is Nmecha remains second-choice striker between now and May as it will mean Calvert-Lewin has remained both fit and firing. For his impressive finishing capabilities, the German international striker’s hold-up play is simply not at the level Leeds need - it was his downfall on Sunday, too.
But at the minute Leeds have two strikers full of confidence and doing exactly what they were signed to do. If they can keep both fit for the final 12 Premier League games, survival feels very possible.
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