Now that the 2019-20 Ligue 1 season is over, it’s time to hand out some grades to the Paris Saint-Germain players for their performance in the French top flight.
Note: In order to be graded, each player needed to have appeared in at least five Ligue 1 matches this season.
Julian Draxler
Intro: This season, Julian Draxler was hampered by a foot injury at the start of the season, and with Paris Saint-Germain’s squad as deep as its been in years, the Germany international struggled to maintain his place in Thomas Tuchel’s rotation.
Throughout Ligue 1 play, Draxler was deployed in multiple different positions, including as a midfielder and attacking winger. As you’ll see below, his stats are fairly pedestrian and his future at the club is very much in question.
Stats:
11 Appearances
4 Assists
3 Big Chances Created
38.3 Accurate Passes per Game
0.8 Successful Dribbles per Game
5 Yellow Cards
Final Grade: D
Outlook: Following his €35 million transfer from VfL Wolfsburg in January of 2017, the 26-year-old has been a fringe player in Paris. The issue is that with Angel Di Maria, Kylian Mbappé, and Neymar Jr., PSG are stacked at both wings. The same goes if he moves to the midfield where he faces competition from Marco Verratti, Idrissa Gueye, and Leandro Paredes.
Draxler is desperate for playing time as he hopes to make the Germany team for next year’s UEFA European Championship. Despite the financial impact the coronavirus is having on football clubs, there should be plenty of interested parties for Draxler, whose contract expires in 2021, when the transfer window opens up. If Draxler is in a PSG kit next season I would be very surprised.
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