Style issues affecting Lukaku

After a bright start, Everton have dipped. Matt Cheetham highlights some key stats which show how long balls and crosses have left Romelu Lukaku on the fringes of the club’s attacking play under Ronald Koeman.

Everton’s late equaliser against Manchester United provided relief for Ronald Koeman, but still left the Toffees on a run of seven points from the last 27 available.

As the Dutchman evaluates his side’s recent slump, a primary concern will be how to get the best out of Romelu Lukaku, who was rarely a threat to United’s defence on Sunday.

The Belgium international failed to record a single shot against United – the second time in four games he has failed to do that. Remarkably, Lukaku had failed to register a shot in just one of his previous 49 starts before this current run.

For the third time in four games, Lukaku also failed to test the goalkeeper with a shot on target, having only failed to do that once in his previous 17 starts.

His shot return, as well as his presence in the penalty area, has dipped drastically over the past few games.

A lot of this has to do with Everton’s increasingly direct approach, which coincides with these diminishing numbers.

They began this season with a five-match unbeaten run. During that spell they hit long passes, on average, just 14.3 per cent of the time. That equates to about one in seven passes being a long one. Over the past few weeks that frequency of long passes has increased to 18.5 per cent. Now, almost one in five passes by Everton players are hit long.

Crosses are also becoming the prominent theme of Everton attacks. Koeman’s Southampton side sent in more than any …

continue reading in source www.skysports.com