Starts as the facilitator, then coolly cleans up a deflection off the post. 🚨 HAJI WRIGHT SCORES!!!! 🙌#USMNT 🇺🇸 https://t.co/6aOSrfGkEI— 🇺🇸 USMNTvsHaters (@USMNTvsHaters) March 11, 2023
2-0 with an assist for Wright. Some very confident dribbling by Wright to set up the goal. Video: 🎥 Nice work from Haji Wright on the left flank to get an assist 👏👏👏 #USMNT 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/54Mz5GgFSN— 🇺🇸 USMNTvsHaters (@USMNTvsHaters) March 11, 2023
3-0. Another Haji Wright goal. Powerful header, but the goalkeeper perhaps should have done better as it's from rather far from goal. ¡GOLEA EL ANTALYASPOR! 🥳Haji Wright anota su segundo del encuentro 💥🍿 Disfruta el Antalyaspor vs. Kayserispor en vivo por beIN SPORTS CONNECT.#Superlig 🇹🇷 #ANTvKYS pic.twitter.com/NkXG25ShaE— beIN SPORTS Español (@ESbeINSPORTS) March 11, 2023
In a much lower-standard league. The question is whether he can transfer that to a Top 5 side. I think he can, but he was utterly unable to perform at that level when he was at Schalke. Yes, Schalke was a club where careers went to die back then, so it's not as if he was alone in that, but we won't know until - not if - it happens.
Haji at Schalke - they threw him out there out of desperation before he was ready. Only 20, and didn't have anywhere near the tactical awareness he does now. I share your lack of confidence that he'll definitely succeed at a higher level, but his time at Schalke is a pretty sketchy data set, given that it's four years later.
Pepi and Wright are showing very well in weak teams in mid-level leagues. The Super Lig is ranked #12 and the Ered is close to the Top 5 as #6 (although with the Portuguese they keep switching for that spot).
He's approaching 50 goals since leaving Schalke for VVV four years ago, 41 of them in Denmark and Turkey, and as has already been mentioned about 57 times, did he pile up his goals against the crappers because if we're gonna crap on the league, we might as well take a look and see if he scored against the good teams in the league (you know, like looking at Sargent, who I love, but recognize dude has basically never scored against any side of quality ever for the most part) and there ya go: In Denmark he scored on Midtjylland for his first goal, and added a goal against Brondby, 2 of his goals there were against the best teams in Denmark (those sides grabbed the top 2 spots that year and are Europa/CL regulars). In Turkey the past two seasons he's scored on the more famous, typical powers (Fenerbahce, and Beskitas) as well as the shock league winners from '21-'22 Trabzonspor, who he scored against 3 times. So over the past 3 seasons not only has he scored 41, but he's also scored 7 of those 41 against perennial powers, and champions. So yep, its more than reasonable to point out that he's scored a ton of goals against mid table and crap sides, but it's also relevant to note that essentially 1 out of every 6 of his goals has been against the best sides in those leagues. I make no claim that he'll break into stardom at any point going forward, I think he's too limited, too specific of a player to do that, but he's already laid down a marker in his age 22, 23 and 24 seasons with: 13 goals in 2300 minutes in his age 22 season. 15 goals in 2000+ minutes in his age 23 season. 13 goals in 1600 minutes thus far in this age 24 season. For whatever reason any time he scores people find a reason to mention in his thread, or the general yanks abroad thread how bad the defense was....why isn't that mentioned for others? I tend to think it's because people don't want to move off their priors, that he sucks, that he's a busted prospect. I get it, after the fall from grace from 2018 through the spring of 2020, I moved on and threw him in the failed prospect bin. But at this point its damn near impossible to ignore what he's been doing, building and building and building. He's been the most consistent reliable scorer we've had in Europe the past three seasons, passing Pefok by in the process. At some point you have to respect it, it may not be up to Bundesliga standards, but it is happening, he is finally scoring goals on the regular. He's a legit striker in Europe with back to back to back double digit seasons and would probably be in England were it not for an injury during the January transfer window. He will be moving on after this season, there is no doubt of that, 28 goals in 3600 minutes tends to encourage transfer offers.
12/2 G/A in 18 games is pretty remarkable given he is on a mid-table team in that league. It is certainly time for him to move on to a better league. I would prefer a moderate step up in competition... like the Eredivisie or Ligue 1.
Made Team of the Week: 🚨Haji Wright is in the SofaScore Super Lig 🇹🇷 Team of the Week🏆He is also the highest rated player in the team 8️⃣.5️⃣#USMNT pic.twitter.com/kl8LNlEBYp— USMNT burner (@burnerusmnt) March 14, 2023
Seems to be the lowest scoring league of all the leagues, interesting study on goal scoring in the big 5 leagues from the last decade is here: Frontiers | Comparison of Goal Scoring Patterns in “The Big Five” European Football Leagues (frontiersin.org) I'd be a little nervous if he went there, would prefer him to back to the Netherlands or Germany, I think he'd be fine this time around in either league, his confidence is up, he's refined his game, he can score, and if that study is right about Germany, it should suit him reasonably well as long as he's happy there.
It's possible that many Galatasaray fans would instead choose Taffarel, since they won the UEFA Cup with him (the only time a Turkish team has ever won a major European trophy).
Süper Lig'de bu sezon maç başına Comparisonator Ofansif Index puanlarına göre en iyi performans gösteren forvet oyuncuları:🥇 Enner Valencia – 409🥈 Mauro Icardi – 345🥉 Fabio Borini – 2974⃣ Younes Belhanda – 2905⃣ Haji Wright – 269(@ComparisonatorT)— GALATASARAY RUHU (@FlasHaberGs) March 31, 2023 The best performing strikers in the Super League this season, according to the Comparisonator Offensive Index points per game:
Inter Milan interest: RumorsTransfersNews24/7 @rumorstransfers Inter are keen on signing USA international forward Haji Wright from Antalyaspor. (Tuttomercatoweb)