Chelsea defensive midfielder scouting series part five: Aurelien Tchouameni

All of the midfielders we’ve discussed in this series thus far are already playing in the Premier League. This gives them a slight advantage, as they’d be playing in the same environment—but with different teammates—if they were to move to Chelsea. However we cannot ignore players playing in other leagues because many of the players who have written their names in the history books of the Premier League were bought from other leagues. In part four, we discussed West Ham key man, Declan Rice. In this part, we’d be discussing a multitalented, all-action central defensive minded midfielder, AS Monaco’s Aurelien Tchouameni.

Tchouameni is more of a box-to-box midfielder than he is a pure defensive midfielder, but he exhibits almost everything you’d want in either role. Tchouameni might be the perfect piece to slot into Thomas Tuchel’s 3-4-3 formation. His work rate off the ball and his actions on it show that he’s the perfect central midfielder for Chelsea. His pressing, ball movement and decisive passes indicate that he’d be just as useful in the defensive, offensive and middle thirds of the pitch.

Tchouameni works hard to deny opponents off the ball, but he is also a goal threat. He looks to distribute the ball effectively when in possession, and he’s a competent enough dribbler to get past opponents when he needs to. He has been an important figure in Monaco’s midfield this season. A testament to Tchouameni’s influence is the fact that he’s started—and played—34 out of 36 league games for Monaco this season. His performances helped Les Monegasques to a third place finish in League 1, just five points behind the title winners, Lille. WhoScored has the Frenchman as the third best performing player and SofaScore has him as the best. This is impressive as Tchouameni has only scored two goals and assisted three, so those ratings are not heavily influenced by goal involvements.

We scrutinize Tchouameni’s numbers over the past two seasons and compare them with Chelsea’s N’Golo Kante (you know the drill). It is important to note that Tchouameni spent most of his playing time last season with Ligue 1 side Bordeaux.