The Gravity of Mikey Johnston

Pete looks at Johnston's ability to impact games without goals and assists...

Coming to a new league where not many have played against you can allow you a bit more space on the ball, a bit more freedom, a bit more unpredictability. Once you’ve scored six goals in just nine appearances this all begins to fade. Defenders know your threat, they know what you want to do and their teammates know when they need to double up to stop you. That’s what’s happened to Mikey Johnston.

Jed Wallace has recently described Johnston as the best player in the Championship on current form, and it’s not hard to see why. The Scottish international has scored six and assisted one since joining The Albion on loan, all in just 6.7 90s – that’s over a goal contribution every full game.

Johnston’s best attribute is his ability to glide past players, he can carry the ball over long distances leaving defenders in his wake. He’s excellent in tight spaces as well, Johnston is one of the best dribblers in the Championship – he attempts 7 per 90 and completes them at a 68% success rate. Only one winger can compete with him in both quantity and quality of dribbles – Tom Fellows.

The goals that Johnston scored against Cardiff and Plymouth showcased his ability go get out of tight spaces, in both goals Johnston nutmegged a defender, glided past other defenders and found the space inside the box to curl an effort into the far corner. Those goals were the archetype of what Johnston wants to do – receive the ball wide, drive into the penalty area and find room in the half-space to curl an effort to the far side of the goal.

Now that defenders have seen that multiple times, they know that it’s what Johnston is looking to do. However, when a player is that good at dribbling, it’s very difficult to stop. That is why Johnston has gained this gravity. It’s something that the very best dribblers have – just look at Messi play, he’ll almost always attract three or four defenders to him when he’s running with the ball.

It may be the only way of stopping Johnston from doing what he wants to do, it just means he needs to change the idea of what he wants to do. His recent performances have shown he’s able to do that.

You can see that when Johnston receives the ball for his goal against Huddersfield he only has one defender near him. Johnston drives forward, the defender keeps backing off as he doesn’t want to commit and let Johnston take him out of the game. Once Johnston gets to his favourite area, the edge of the box in the half-space, Helik realises that he needs to support his teammate to stop Johnston from performing his trademark cut inside and curl to the far post.

The Huddersfield defenders show Johnston down the line, making sure he can’t cut inside. Johnston has two options at that point, go onto his weak foot like the defenders are trying to force him to, or force himself inside and try and take two defenders on – where he’d likely lose the ball. One important factor is that Johnston’s gravity has forced Helik to double up on him and leave Wallace free in the centre of the box.

Johnston makes the right decision and uses the space that he is shown, where he has the space to get a shot off and finishes well. He probably makes the wrong decision in the final action – a better choice would probably be to square it to Wallace who could tap in. There’s obviously no complaints when Johnston finishes, but in a similar situation it’d be more profitable to square the ball and make full use of the gravity that Johnston has gained.