Marseille boss Jean-Louis Gasset believes Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is a player you build your team around, with the striker in great form this season.
Former Arsenal striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang made history last week when he became the all-time top scorer in the Europa League, but it wasn’t simply the case of the striker hitting a long-awaited milestone.
Aubameyang has scored nine goals in eight Europa League games this season, comfortably leading the top scorer charts in the competition.
Only Romelu Lukaku comes close, with seven goals for AS Roma.
Outside of the Europa League, Aubameyang’s goalscoring form isn’t quite so eye-catching, with 14 goals in his other 29 games between Ligue 1, the Coupe de France, and the Champions League qualifiers.
But when you add in his seven assists in Ligue 1, and one in the Europa League, it’s clear he’s having a great season.
The striker’s two goals in Marseille’s Champions League qualifier against Panathinaikos should have been the heroics needed to see Marseille into the next round, if not for a mistake and a missed penalty from another former Gunner in Matteo Guendouzi.
Yet Aubameyang has made the best of his circumstances after dropping down to the Europa League, and he’s certainly won his manager’s confidence.
“He is the goalscorer, the player of the team,” Jean-Louis Gasset said (via GFFN). “There is one in every team, in every team in the world there is a player that makes the difference.
“We have to protect him and put him in the right places to allow him to keep his energy to make the difference.
“I knew him; I spoke with friends who had coached him. I knew where he liked to play, and the positions that he liked to move into. He is the player and you then build the team around him.”
With a goal or assist every 90 minutes, Aubameyang has come a long way from the Chelsea spell where he managed one every 240.
Aubameyang was criticised earlier in the campaign for treating Marseille as his “nursing home”, a place to retire. But the 34-year-old is looking more like his former Arsenal, Dortmund, or Barcelona self now.