Edon Zhegrova Scouting Report At Lille OSC 2024/25 Under Bruno Génésio Tactics

Bruno Génésio’s start to life at Lille OSC has been quite positive, with the 58-year-old former Rennes and Lyon manager guiding Les Dogues to back-to-back UEFA Champions League victories over both Real Madrid and, most recently, Atlético Madrid.

Domestically, Lille currently sit fourth in Ligue 1, having won four, drawn two and lost two of their opening eight games this season.

It hasn’t all been sunshine and rainbows for Lille to start 2024/25, however, as one negative piece of news emerging from the Hauts-de-France club is the story that star attacker Jonathan David — who made Total Football Analysis’ 2023/24 Ligue 1 Team of the Season — read that piece of analysis here (linked on the word ‘analysis’) is looking like not renewing his contract, which is currently set to expire next summer.

Serie A giants Juventus and Inter are said to be circling the Canadian attacker, and Premier League interest has also been reported.

David bagged two goals in Lille’s Champions League comeback win over Atlético this week, while

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While David tends to grab the headlines a little more than Zhegrova and does, indeed, play in the centre of Lille’s attack — a position that naturally attracts more attention than any other — Zhegrova is just as if not more important to Lille’s attacking system this season under Génésio.

This tactical analysis, which will take the form of a player-focused scout report, will analyse Zhegrova’s key strengths and weaknesses.

We’ll analyse Zhegrova’s role within his team’s tactics and highlight exactly why, for us, he’s the key man for Lille in 2024/25.

Data Analysis

Initially joining Lille from Swiss Super League side FC Basel in January 2022 for a transfer fee of €7m, Zhegrova has consistently gone from strength to strength at Stade Pierre-Mauroy — as is indicated by his market value increasing from just €2m when he first moved to France all the way to €25m today.

Scoring twice and making one assist in 14 games for Lille in 2021/22, Zhegrova went on to score four and assist five in his first full season with Les Dogues — 2022/23 — before increasing those numbers to 12 goals and 10 assists in 47 games last term.

The 25-year-old has only played 13 games so far this season.

Still, he already has seven goals and one assist, putting himself in a good position to break new ground at Stade Pierre-Mauroy again in 2024/25.

Zhegrova is fairly heavily involved in his team’s possession play but isn’t necessarily a standout on the creativity front, as is evident from his unimpressive percentile rank in ‘dangerous passes per 90’ when compared with other players in his position from Europe’s top-five leagues.

Where he really stands out is in his goalscoring ability and dribbling.

Zhegrova has an excellent shot and constantly exhibits a certain fearlessness on the ball, which allows him to take on defenders nonstop.

This makes him a constant threat on the right as Lille look to progress into the opposition’s penalty area or score from outside of it.

Zhegrova isn’t an assist-machine, nor does he make a particularly impressive defensive contribution for his team.

However, as a goalscoring and dribbling threat from the right wing, there are few better in elite football across the globe right now than the Lille man.

Interestingly, per Understat, Zhegrova has the highest xGChain (5.23) of any Lille player for 2024/25.

The xGChain statistic is defined as the “total xG of every possession the player is involved in,” and his high value in this particular metric highlights his vital role in Génésio’s side, even if others sometimes overlook him.

Edon Zhegrova Dribbling Analysis

Edon Zhegrova’s style of play currently ranks in the 90th percentile for dribbles per 90 for players in his position in Europe’s top-five leagues. At the same time, he ended 2023/24 in the 98th percentile for that particular metric among his peers.

Clearly, the winger’s ball-carrying ability is at an elite level, and this is evident from the fact that out of his 13 games so far this season, the Kosovo international has completed 68 penetrating carries, averaging 5.23 per 90.

Zhegrova is an excellent tool for Lille off the right-hand side as they try to progress the ball into the opposition’s penalty area, but how exactly does he do it?

Zhegrova has a great level of balance and agility, firstly, which is typically key for any great dribbler.

In Figure 3 above, we see an example of Zhegrova quickly shifting his weight to the right before dragging the ball across and exploding past the defender on the outside to complete a penetrating carry.

Note how Zhegrova receives and initially stands a bit square, drawing the defender into a false sense of security and opening up space behind him, which the Kosovan winger can then target.

Also note how quickly the 25-year-old manages to get away behind the defender once he makes his move, showcasing another key quality of Zhegrova’s as a dribbler: his acceleration.

Our next example is taken from Lille’s UCL win over Real Madrid.

Here, we again see Zhegrova drawing the defender in before making his next move.

On this occasion, we see the Lille man lift his leg and firmly plant it on the left, causing his opponent to shift to that side briefly and thus opening up the space on the other side.

After that space opens up, Zhegrova goes for it, knocking the ball beyond his opponent and chasing it down, exploding away into the space that’s now been opened up behind.

From here, Zhegrova is away and difficult to catch, yet again highlighting his acceleration, balance, and agility while pulling off a move that is very similar to the one he performed in Figure 3 in many ways.

Another example is shown here versus Toulouse.

Zhegrova waits on the ball, draws the defender in, feints to the left, bursts in behind on the right, and accelerates away.

Here, with the defender approaching from Zhegrova’s left, the dribbler again sees the threat coming and feints one way before exiting on the other, leaving his opponent for dust.

So, to answer the question: “How does Zhegrova dribble?” in overly simplistic terms, he frequently draws defenders in close before using his balance, agility and speed to explode into the space behind the player who’s been drawn in.

Edon Zhegrova Shooting Analysis

As mentioned, Zhegrova’s a key goalscoring threat for Lille off the right — arguably one of the biggest right-sided goalscoring threats in one of Europe’s top leagues at the moment.

The winger has scored 24 non-penalty goals while generating 16.47 non-penalty xG for Lille thus far in his career with the French club.

Looking at the green dots on the shot map, we can see that plenty of his goals have come from distance; 10 of the 24, in fact, came from outside the box, some from ridiculous angles, as the viz displays.

Already this season alone, the winger has scored four goals from outside the penalty box — more than half of his total of seven.

Zhegrova is usually happy to receive a bit deeper on the wing.

He’s not constantly positioned on the defender’s shoulder and looking to be played in behind.

He likes to receive the ball to his feet with three or four yards between him and the nearest defender, who’s focusing on protecting the space in behind and maintaining a tight block with his defensive partners, keeping Zhegrova at a distance.

We can see this in the top two images of Figure 9 and the bottom left image, in the latter of which we can see Zhegrova carrying the ball towards the box ever so slightly before opening up his body for a curled shot towards the far post.

This goal resulted from Zhegrova being given too much space at a distance which, although it may be safe with many players, is not safe when this attacker is on the ball.

As this example shows, Zhegrova possesses a very strong ability to hit the ball powerfully and accurately.

In Figure 10, we see an example of Zhegrova coming inside to exploit space centrally and give his centre-back a decent progressive passing option.

After a quick scan over his right shoulder before receiving, he gets on the ball, turns, drives across goal and again creates a shooting angle that may seem far-fetched for most attackers but is within the realms of goalscoring possibility for him, as he successfully demonstrated with a low driven shot into the far corner of the net here.

Zhegrova has a range of strikes in his locker, which makes him a bit unpredictable.

He’s just as capable of firing a low-driven shot across goal with his body over the ball as he is to open up his body and curl the ball towards the far corner that way.

In addition, his combination of long-range shooting ability and dribbling ability makes him incredibly difficult to defend against.

Defenders can suffer by giving him too much space in front of them, which can allow him to take a dangerous shot.

They can also suffer if they close him down and open up space behind for the winger to target.

The dilemma this poses to defenders can cause confusion, making Zhegrova a very valuable player for getting on the ball early for Lille, as we saw Génésio’s side do in our examples.

Edon Zhegrova Movement & Link Play Analysis

Our final section of this scout report focuses on Zhegrova’s off-the-ball attacking movement and link-up play, which is where he can contribute significantly to the creation of goals outside of his actual goalscoring ability.

Indeed, Zhegrova is a great goalscoring threat.

While he doesn’t typically directly create many chances, he does tend to be involved in many moves that result in good chances, which is not a coincidence.

See Figure 11 for the kinds of areas you’re most likely to find Zhegrova occupying in a given game.

Yes, he’s most frequently found out wide on the right, but he will also drift into central areas, as we caught a glimpse of in Figure 10.

Figure 12 provides another example of Zhegrova’s central involvement leading to positive involvement in Lille’s possession.

Zhegrova spots some space centrally and moves inside to occupy it, creating an overload and a dilemma for the opposition players defending this area.

One of them is marking another Lille player closely, not wanting to leave him to pick up Zhegrova.

This allows Zhegrova time and space to receive, turn and carry the ball forward before linking up with a teammate and offering a return option via his acceleration behind the nearest defender as Les Dogues advances into the opponent’s half.

A lot of the time, when Zhegrova gets to his feet, he’s forced backwards again by tight marking behind him—this is where opponents can successfully keep him quiet.

When he’s facing forward, it’s very difficult to stop him without elite defensive quality, no matter what approach you take.

However, with his back to goal, he can, at least, be forced to play the ball backwards and denied a chance to turn and progress play.

On this occasion, we see how the opponents left him free to receive, which allows him to turn and effectively get Lille into the opposition’s half, significantly increasing their level of threat through his involvement in the play.

Conclusion

To conclude our tactical analysis and scout report, nobody plays as crucial a role as Zhegrova does at present when it comes to involvement in Lille’s ball progression and chance creation phases.

Hence, we classified him as their key man under Bruno Génésio in 2024/25.

If he can maintain his form throughout the season, Lille could end up looking back on this campaign under Génésio as a very positive one.