No U21 player across Europe's big five leagues has scored as many goals this season as Arsenal loanee Folarin Balogun.He's tearing up Ligue 1 🔥 pic.twitter.com/9gntBCUmyC— ESPN UK (@ESPNUK) January 30, 2023
Yeah and so are Kane, Rashford, Ivan Toney, Tammy Abraham, Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Callum Wilson and so on
Old, winger, incoming ban, plays abroad so he might as well be dead, perma-injured, and old, respectively. England's striker corps isn't as deep as it seemed 18 months ago. His biggest competition two or three years down the road might genuinely be Nketiah, depending on how Kane develops in his 30s, and I think Balogun would probably bet on himself in that fight.
May depend on how long he’s willing to wait. No. 9s can play pretty long. Kane may start for England until he’s 33/34/35 or Kane might drop off before then. Hopefully we keep up a steady charm offensive and he perhaps we land him.
I'm sure the USMNT head coach will reach out to him. Or the GM. Or the technical director. I'm positive US Soccer is on top of it.
Team of the Week: 6 clubs sont représentés dans votre #11TypeFans de la 20e journée ! Merci pour vos nombreuses participations 🤝 pic.twitter.com/Q0HThdtmYj— Ligue 1 Uber Eats (@Ligue1UberEats) January 31, 2023
He's a rich man's Pepi. He doesn't get many touches, he doesn't hold up or link play very well, but he's been scoring at a very good clip. Still have doubts he'll be quite as good as this run suggests. Will be interesting to see what Arsenal does with him next season.
I am hearing a rumor that Weston's supposed friend 29 from twitter is saying this guy will be choosing the US. I am not a twitter person.
Either he's Weston' friend, Weston himself, or a pretty good guesser of things. It could be a combination of the two. For example, it is Weston and he's making educated guesses. This is probably what happened. Weah ran into Balogun and they went out for a couple of croque monsieurs on the down low since they aren't part of an approved professional athlete diet plan. Weah put an image of this on his instagram page, but only fellow "mountain boy" Deandre Yedlin had permissions to see the image. Yedlin thought it was funny since Balogun had one of those long strings of cheese falling out of his delicious hot sandwich and saved the image on his phone. Several months later, Yedlin was out at the mall with Phil Neville (once a week they do this. Its an attempt that is mostly failing to get Neville integrated into the culture of the greater Miami metro area) and showed him the image. Phil was polite, but in reality he had entered a fugue state brought on by a severe case of dual national panic. He told one person, they told another, and next thing you know shortly after Weston's introduction to Leeds he meets author and super Leeds expert Phil Hay who is congratulating him on Balogun picking the USA. Weston immediately puts on a disguise (he always does this before tweeting as 29) and leaks the rumor as a done deal since he can't imagine someone as will respected as Phil Hay getting it wrong. Anyway, I feel like this is the most likely chain of events.
I was thinking players like Musah who may have some influence over him. I would imagine fellow players who you have a positive history with could be good recruiters.
Starts: ⏰ Coup d'envoi dans 45 minutes 🔥🧐 Coup d'oeil sur le 11 de départ rémois qui affrontera le @FCLorient ce soir ⤵️#SDRFCL #GoSDR pic.twitter.com/2LRQQNi06n— Stade de Reims (@StadeDeReims) February 1, 2023
Scored a PK: ⚽️ Réduction du score rémoise ! 🔥 Sur penalty, @balogun trompe Mannone et ramène les Rouge & Blanc à une longueur ! #SDRFCL #GoSDR 1-2 | 43’— Stade de Reims (@StadeDeReims) February 1, 2023 1620860314035322882 is not a valid tweet id
⚽️ Cette fois c'est la bonne ! @balogun détourne dans les filets un service d'@ItouJky ! 💥💥 Le SDR reprend l'avantage ! #SDRFCL #GoSDR 3-2 | 60’— Stade de Reims (@StadeDeReims) February 1, 2023 ⚽️ @balogun is on 🔥 !! Sur un service d'Emmanuel Agbadou, l'attaquant s'offre le triplé et permet aux Rémois de compter deux buts d'avance ! #SDRFCL #GoSDR 4-2 | 63’— Stade de Reims (@StadeDeReims) February 1, 2023
ESPN FC @ESPNFC 21-year-old Arsenal loanee Folarin Balogun has a hat trick for Reims and is now the top goalscorer in Ligue 1, ahead of Mbappe and Neymar The future is bright
One of the goals: Folarin Balogun. That’s it, that’s the tweet. https://t.co/B43H3q8Snq— Renato (@rehnato) February 1, 2023
Five different angles of Folarin Balogun’s stupendous volleyed goal (his hattrick goal) 🤩🤩 #afc https://t.co/ADHioS4nSX— Gilles 🇳🇬🏴 (@_Grimanditweets) February 1, 2023
Sofascore @SofascoreINT Balogun has today become the first U21 player to score a hat-trick in the top 5 European leagues this season. Arsenal's youngster is having an exceptional loan spell in France. #SDRFCL
Mbappe take the field to take back the league lead in goals. Has a penalty saved, but gets a retake, hits the post with it, but gets the rebound, hits it over the top, and then asks to be subbed off favoring his hamstring. Balogun continues to lead Ligue 1 in goals.
Man, I would love to have him commit to the USMNT. But.... The more this purple patch continues, the more I doubt we have a shot. Gareth Southgate is probably texting him right this moment.. And since we do not have a GM or a coach, not sure who we could send to keep up the recruitment pursuit.
It's always a weird spot to be in these situations. We want the player to be good, but not too good, like Pefok. You end up with a ceiling if you're chasing dual nats like that. They pretty much have to be willing to commit early, like Musah, or the upside isn't very high. Hard to compete for titles against countries using their rejects. This guy may well be able to play for England in the end, and it seems like it's what he prefers to do. So there'd have to be a sudden change of heart here.