Rating a player’s performance on a football pitch has often been a topic of great debate. Traditional metrics such as goals and assists do not present a full picture of a player’s consistency, especially in modern football. Also, a player representing a rich, established club in Europe spends a lot of time in the limelight and his performances are more vividly remembered than the footballers representing the lesser clubs. Taking all the above factors into consideration, this article will talk about five criminally underrated players plying their trade in Europe’s top five leagues,
5. Wissam Ben Yedder
A striker who is versatile enough to play across the frontline, Ben Yedder’s career has progressed steadily in the past three seasons. 2018/19 season for Sevilla was Yedder’s moment in the spotlight as he scored 18 goals and assisted 9 times.
A summer transfer to Monaco followed, and he showed his potential by finishing as the joint highest goalscorer alongside Mbappé in the 19/20 season. This season he has 17 goal contributions and has become an indispensable member of the Monaco squad. He still has a long way to go before being considered among elite players in Europe, but his talent is becoming hard to ignore.
4. Luis Alberto
Immobile’s goalscoring record has caught everyone’s attention in recent times but the man supplying him regularly continues to evade the eye of a normal football fan. Luis Alberto is an unknown entity for those who do not follow Serie A closely, but he is a well-respected playmaker in Italy.
With 11 goals and 14 assists in the 2017/18 Serie A, he joined a rare list of players to reach double figures in goals and assists while playing in Serie A. He was a vital cog of Lazio’s title-challenging unit last season, scoring six times and assisting 15 times in the season. He has appeared only once for Spain and that is part of the reason why many do not know him.
3. Andrej Kramaric
Kramaric’s best moments in the Hoffenheim shirt have come against Bayern Munich which is a testament to his ability to raise the bar when stakes are high. Earlier in the season, his brace ended Bayern Munich’s 23 games unbeaten run while in 2017 he scored the winner to secure victory for Hoffenheim against the Bavarians.
In the last Match day of the 2019/20 season, Kramaric stunned Dortmund by scoring four goals including a no-look penalty. With Mandzukic’s retirement, the onus is on Kramaric to lead Croatia’s attack, and it is a safe bet to say that he will score a lot of goals for his country in the near future.
2. Iago Aspas
Iago Aspas, Celta Vigo’s greatest player ever has also been the most prolific Spaniard on the planet for the past few years. He has scored over a hundred goals in La Liga since returning to La Liga in 2015 and only Lionel Messi has more goal contributions than him during this period.
Despite all these records and the ability to win matches of his own, Aspas’ name barely gets mentioned when discussing the best strikers in Europe. He has also become a regular starter for his country and could well break more records in the future.
1. Luis Muriel
Despite all his talent, Muriel has lived under the shadow of fellow Colombian Duvan Zapata in his Atalanta career. The amount of goals he has scored for Atalanta is simply staggering considering the fact that he mostly plays as a substitute. Despite starting only 10 games this season, Muriel has 18 goals and 6 assists to his name.
Last season, he scored 15 goals at a frequency of a goal every 69 minutes. In comparison, top strikers in Europe and even Robert Lewandowski does not score that frequently. Muriel definitely deserves more playing time with such an outstanding record, and he could attract much attention in the summer from Europe’s elite if he continues playing this way.
