There will be two young French midfielders battling each other for a spot in West Ham United’s midfield next season; Mohamadou Kante and Soungoutou Magassa.
As things stand, Kante looks well-placed to start away to Burnley on August 16th when the Championship season kicks off.
Compatriot Magassa has not played a minute of West Ham United’s three friendlies against Southend, Stevenage and Rangers. The former Monaco man is still building up his fitness after suffering an injury late last term.
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So with Magassa not yet fit, as Tomas Soucek faces a longer period on the sidelines and because the Hammers are yet to bring in any new faces to offset the loss of Mateus Fernandes, it would be a surprise if Mohamadou Kante was not on the team sheet at Turf Moor.
Yet, despite the considerable hype surrounding the £500,000 signing from Paris FC, those pre-season outings have shown that Kante still has a lot to learn. Particularly, defensively.
West Ham United have a lot to work on with Mohamadou Kante
One of the big issues faced by Soungoutou Magassa during his debut season on English soil was his positioning off the ball, and how he struggled to stamp out the fires burning a hole through Nuno’s midfield.
Magassa is renowned for his ‘aggressiveness’. This was an attribute former Monaco coach Adi Hutter talked up during his breakout in the Principality. However, there is a downside.
Magassa would often dive in, try to intercept the ball high up the pitch, before leaving himself exposed and out of position.
When a pass zipped by him, Magassa lacked the speed to recover as the opposition darted into the space he vacated.
“He can improve, to sometimes react faster or anticipate situations,” said the aforementioned Hutter. “But this position is difficult, because you have to be very reactive when losing the ball.
“In any case, I like his aggressiveness!”
The result is that, during much of his debut campaign in claret and blue, Magassa would spend his afternoons chasing shadows, opposition teams popping the ball around him like he was the proverbial ‘piggy’ in the middle of a rondo.
At Ibrox on Sunday – West Ham played out an uninspired 0-0 draw with Rangers – similar problems could be seen in Kante’s game.
Kante was ‘struggling’ at Ibrox as Rangers held firm
Former Hammers stalwart James Collins sees shades of Mark Noble in the way Kante plays with the ball at his feet. Without it, however, Rangers shone a light on the immaturity and positional slackness you might expect from a 20-year-old with zero league starts under his belt.
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“Midfield needs signings,” one fan wrote on social media on a day when Keiber Lamadrid again outperformed his midfield partner. “Kante is a good player but is too casual. Lamadrid has been better of the two.”
“Kante struggling defensively a lot,” said another.
He wasn’t particularly great on the ball either – a fair few slack passes – but something Nuno will be desperate to fix is Kante’s tendency to be caught in no-man’s land. Like Magassa, he has a habit of charging into tackles, only to then find himself beaten by a simple pass into the man loitering on his shoulder.
Rangers could not take advantage – Mads Hermansen had a fine game between the sticks – but higher quality opposition with better finishers might just.
Rui Pedro Silva, Nuno’s tough-talking assistant coach, said it best at full-time. As talented as the current crop may be, West Ham’s kids must ‘grow up’ fast if they are to survive the churn of the Championship.
This is no place for armbands and shallow ends; choppy waters await and Kante is yet to prove he can battle against the tide.
“[The youngsters] need to grow up, they need to feel what it is to play for a big club,” Silva said. “We are developing these kind of players, and sometimes the game is the best moment for them to feel the pressure, to increase their game.
“But the process, the movements, the intention to do that, it’s there. So when they will be fresh, they will be more sharp and that’s important to know.”
Of course, the best way to develop these skills, to hone these weaknesses, is to play competitive football week-in, week-out.
Mohamadou Kante is far from the finished article at this stage. Then again, no one should ever have expected him to be.
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