Takuma Asano is on fire in pre-season, and scored yet another goal, against Athletic Bilbao on Saturday, to keep his run going.
In total, Asano has managed a goal or assist per game throughout pre-season, with six of the former and one of the latter. He scored twice and assisted one on his debut against Ramlingen-Ehlershausen, then scored against Wacker Nordhausen, Wolfsberger, Udinese and Bilbao.
If those goals counted competitively, Asano would have already overtaken his tally for last season, when he was left in the reserves for long periods of time with Stuttgart. Suffice to say he seems set for a much better season this time around.
Videos of goals in Hannover’s pre-season friendlies aren’t exactly easy to come by, but here are the ones we could get our hands on:
Here's a video of his goal: pic.twitter.com/ruVAFbf7be
— AFC LoanWatch (@AFC_Loanwatch) August 1, 2018
Asano scores his fifth goal in six games for Hannover in pre-season, this time poaching a tap in against Udinese #AFC pic.twitter.com/HQjHTSHUOY
— Dan Critchlow (@afcDW) August 4, 2018
Correction: 1 goal but no assist. Here is a video: pic.twitter.com/vA8LeTxQ3r
— AFC LoanWatch (@AFC_Loanwatch) August 11, 2018
As you can see in the clips, the main strength of Asano’s game continues to be his movement. He finds space well, and is improving in finishing off chances as well. It’s particularly good to see that the goals didn’t dry up against tougher opposition.
Now the Japanese international just needs to show he can do it in the competitive matches as well. First up, they have a cup match against Karlsruher next Sunday. There’s no time to relax after that though, with matches against Borussia Dortmund and RB Leipzig in their first 3 Bundesliga fixtures. Hopefully it all goes well for Asano.