This week, Rangers News translated an article from Italian journalist Alfredo Pedulla. The article claims that Rangers are interested in signing Kansas City player Gianluca Busio. The 17-year-old is on the radar of multiple teams in Europe such as Inter Milan and Manchester United.
The player made 22 appearances in the MLS last season, starting 10 of the matches. He also managed to score four goals and register two assists during the MLS season. But what if you want to know more about Busio? Luckily we have all the stats you need here.
TIF Tactics – What kind of a player is Gianluca Busio?
Being just 17, Busio has only played 3805 minutes of senior football in his career. A whole 2520 of those minutes were played this season. We will look at his key statistics over an average of 90 minutes. These minutes also include his time playing with the American national program.
Despite scoring just four goals in the MLS, Busio scored 10 goals in all competitions last season, and 12 in total throughout his career. That brings his average goals per 90 minutes to 0.28. This is just slightly higher than his xG (expected goals) of 0.25. Should the player continue to score at the rate that he currently is, he can expect to extend the gap between his average goals scored and his average xG.
Regarding shots on target, Busio averages 2.55 shots every 90 minutes, 33.3% of which are on target. If we isolate his shots taken during the 2019 season only, his average shot accuracy is 38.2%. This suggests the player’s accuracy is slowly beginning to increase.
His passing is also impressive. Busio matches his xA (expected assists) of 0.09 per 90 minutes. He also averages 0.07 second-assists per game. This indicates the number of times he passes the ball to the person who assists the goal. Busio averages 1.06 shot assists per game as well. This highlights that the player is quite capable of passing the ball to teammates in goal scoring opportunities.
The American averages 68.55 total actions per game, 59.5% of which are successful. The numbers in this article suggest that there is still a lot of work to be done before Busio can be considered a world-class player. However, at just 17-years-old, his potential is staggering.
(all data and stats from Wyscout.com, accurate at the time of writing)