If Nathan Redmond can become even half the player Henry was, Southampton fans are in for a treat.
Southampton’s Nathan Redmond is fouled by Arsenal’s Nacho Monreal resulting in a yellow card
After the usual Southampton summer exodus, Claude Puel was charged with rebuilding the squad at a fraction of the price. Nathan Redmond was brought in to replace the departing Saido Mane, and will be expected to contribute a number of goals and assists this season if Southampton are going to have any chance of replicating last year’s sixth place finish.
Saturday’s game saw Redmond’s gradual transformation from winger to centre-forward continue, and in front of an Arsenal crowd that fondly remembers their all-time top goal-scorer, Thierry Henry, with a statue commemorating his service sitting outside the Emirates Stadium, many will be forgiven for finding similarities between the two players.
Whilst Redmond is realistically some way from being spoken about in the same breath as the French World Cup-winner, his move centrally under Puel is reminiscent of the same transformation undergone by Henry at Arsenal.
Thierry Henry celebrates goal v Liverpool 2004
Even Puel has drawn comparisons, stating in an interview with Sky Sports, “I see similarities between the two [Henry and Redmond], with this ability to shoot with the right foot and to curl the ball… “It is two men with the same possibilities, quick, a good ability in the technical and the run also.”
Henry arrived in North London from Juventus in 1999, seven years after joining Wenger’s Monaco side as part of the youth set-up. Wenger went against his natural instincts and deployed Henry as a winger, a decision he would later reverse when the two reunited at Arsenal. But Henry suggests that whilst it was Wenger who completed the player’s transformation into one of the deadliest strikers in world football, it was Puel, his senior team-mate at Monaco, who started the development.
Henry recalls, “I was missing a lot of opportunities to score when I was young. I was taking six chances to score two. I started to work with him [Puel] after training, working on my stamina and my finishing.”
Southampton manager Claude Puel
Henry is not the only player to see serious development under Puel, with the Frenchman handing Eden Hazard with his senior debut at just 16 years of age. Puel also worked with French legend, David Trezeguet, helping him find some of his best goal-scoring form in his last year at Monaco before a big money to Juventus.
Redmond will be hoping Puel can have the same influence on his career going forward, with the winger previously struggling to live up to the high-expectations coaches and press have placed on his shoulders. But with a C.V. of nurturing young attackers, Claude Puel may well be the perfect man to reignite Redmond’s career, and will be hoping the young Englishman can provide even a fraction of the goals Henry achieved during his time in England.
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