Flavien Enzo Boyomo: Osasuna’s Defensive Recruit

Osasuna have already signed Bryan Zaragoza on loan and Abel Bretones to replace the outgoing Johan Mojica. Now they have signed Valladolid center-back Boyomo who has had an excellent beginning to the campaign for €5 million to replace club captain David García who is heading to Qatar for less than €9 million. In this article, we will be investigating Boyomo and what he can offer to Osasuna.

Name: Flavien-Enzo Thiedort Boyomo

Position: Center Back

Country: Cameroon

Age: 23

Height: 184cm

Preferred Foot: Right

Last Club: Real Valladolid

Born in Toulouse to Cameroonian parents, Boyomo began his development at Toulouse’s academy before heading to Blackburn Rovers’ academy, where he spent four years before taking his talents to Albacete. After three years in Albacete, he made the move to Real Valladolid, where he played a key role in their promotion after arriving for €1.2 million, and now, he’s taking the next step of his career in Pamplona.

Forward Passing

Forward passes are crucial for center-backs as they are the ones who have to initiate the play.

Here we can observe that Boyomo has a great ability to progress the ball via passing, having the joint-most passes per 90 and the most precision. This is not something essential to play under Vicente Moreno, however, it is something that gives value to his profile that can be useful when in possession.

Progressive Passing

This passing metric gives us more depth into the danger of each player’s passing rather than just passing the ball forward 5m. This is because this metric only includes more specific passes such as a pass 10m closer to the opposition goal if the pass comes from the opposition side of the pitch.

In this image, we can see that Boyomo’s ability to play dangerous passes is not quite at the height as his forward passes. This means that although he did play more forward passes, perhaps many of these were to the midfielder or the full-back that doesn’t actually progress the play. This may be because he played at Real Valladolid, a team that likes to have possession.

Defensive Duels

Dominating defensive duels is essential for any defender, as their fundamental purpose is to defend his goal, and for that, winning duels is key.

From this image, we can deduce that Boyomo is excellent and dominates his defensive duels with close to an 80% success rate and almost 7 duels per 90. This is something that can be of great use to Osasuna as the manager likes to defend for large periods of matches and counterattack, so he will be exposed to these situations.

Aerial Duels

Aerial duels are essential for any defender who wants to succeed and even more, for those who press high and recover the ball up the pitch, as the opposing team will look to play long, and for that, aerial duels are required.

With this image, we can identify that Boyomo does not have aerial dominance with just above a 50% success rate with more than 2 aerial duels per 90. These numbers are quite poor when compared with the player he is replacing, David García, and this could prove an issue as the season goes on as in La Liga there are attackers that are more effective in aerial duels.

This chart compares Boyomo with the rest of the La Liga players in his position using percentiles in different aspects of the game. The percentiles work in the way that whatever the number, he is better than that percentage of players. If it is 70, he is better than 70%.

In this chart, we can see that Boyomo is great with the ball being above the 70th percentile for touches, passes attempted as well as progressive passes and carries. This tells us that he is quite good with the ball in his feet and can give Osasuna more tools in possession as the current center-backs lack this capacity. 

Furthermore, his 1vs1 defending is excellent being in the 88th percentile for percentage of dribblers tackled which will not be used as much at Osasuna as he won’t be exposed to these actions. This is due to the fact that they will rarely be attacked on the counter and the manager likes his team to be well positioned so the center backs avoid these situations.

Nonetheless, his other defending aspects are quite poor though this could be due to the system he played in as Pezzolano, the Valladolid manager, wants to have the ball and spend less time defending. Moreover, he is only in the 22nd percentile for success rate in aerial duels which can be a huge issue and something he will have to modify to play at Osasuna.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Boyomo is a signing that has its pros and cons as he does have a great ability to play the ball which could improve Osasuna when they have possession significantly. Also, his defensive capacities are by no means bad as he is effective in his defensive duels.

Nonetheless, he is very poor in the air and that could lead to huge issues as David García was excellent aerially and at defending crosses but Boyomo lacks in this aspect. In addition, he has no experience in Spain’s top-flight and has only played in the Second Division so we will have to see how he adapts to the league and Vicente Moreno.

By: Juan Fernandez Valencia / @ScoutLaLiga

Featured Image: @GabFoligno / Quality Sport Images / Getty Images