Donyell Malen is unstoppable.
The Dutch striker also decided the match against Bologna: a goal after just seven minutes and a textbook assist from the outside of his right foot for El Ayanoui.
Roma won 0-2, with the 1999-born player scoring both goals.
He’s hardly even a news story anymore.
Gasperini was confident in the former Aston Villa player’s qualities, but he never imagined he’d have such a devastating impact: “Malen is a player who has certainly raised our level of play significantly. It’s hard to expect his numbers. I knew he was an ideal player, and there was no doubt about his role. I already knew him and had seen him in the friendly in August; it’s better to see players in person. I was convinced he was right for us.”
Donyell Malen has become the new idol of Roma fans. The Dutch striker, after his first touch of the ball in his debut away to Torino, showed a quality unlike any of his teammates: superb technique combined with extraordinary speed.
A perfect cocktail of high blood alcohol levels for opposing defenders, who often get confused, stagger on the pitch, and end the match with a severe headache. Just ask Lucumì, who, in Roma’s 2-0 win at the Dall’Ara, was never able to find the right countermeasures to contain him.
The Giallorossi still hope to catch Juventus’s fourth-place finish, and have found a true driving force in Malen. Since his arrival, the Dutch striker has been involved in 50% of the team’s goals (14 of 28). Incredible numbers for a player who hadn’t reached double figures in his league since the 2022-23 season, his only since 2021. Then he met Gian Piero Gasperini.
Roma has finally found the striker they needed to raise their attacking game. Donyell Malen has already scored 11 league goals, including in key matches. The list of his victims is long: Torino, Cagliari, Napoli, Juventus, Como, Pisa, and Bologna.
Despite his high number of goals, what stands out on the pitch is the ease with which the Dutch striker frees himself to fire shots towards the opponent’s goal.
Considering all the Roma forwards who have played at least 1,000 minutes in the league, the last to shoot as frequently as Malen was Dzeko.
However, we have to go back to the 2018-19 season, when the Bosnian striker scored just nine goals, two fewer than the former Aston Villa player who arrived in mid-January. The 1999-born striker averages a shot every 20.3 minutes, or about four times per game.
These numbers confirm the effectiveness of the Giallorossi’s number 14, who, on average, shot twice as often as Lukaku in Rome (40.6 minutes). Ferguson (29.9 minutes), Kalinic (30.3 minutes), Abraham (32.6 minutes), Shomurodov (37.6 minutes), Dovbyk (38.6 minutes), Schick (38.6 minutes), Mayoral (38.8 minutes), and Belotti (56.8 minutes) follow.
Edin Dzeko leads this particular ranking, with numbers similar to Malen’s, shooting every 19.6 minutes in the 2018-19 season and every 19.8 minutes in 2017-18. It will be difficult to replicate what the Bosnian did in 2016-17: 177 shots, one every 17.2 minutes, and 29 goals in Serie A. Malen, however, is on the right track.
