How will RB Leipzig get their goals with Timo Werner bound for Chelsea?
Timo Werner has joined Chelsea from RB Leipzig following the conclusion of the Bundesliga season. With a UEFA Champions League knockout tournament to play in August, how will Julian Nagelsmann's side find the target without their 28-goal top scorer?
It's true that Werner takes a significant goal-haul with him to London. The Germany international would be the top scorer in the Bundesliga this season if it wasn't for the irrepressible Robert Lewandowski, who claimed his fifth Torjägerkanone.
Nevertheless, Leipzig are still capable of outscoring almost anybody on the continent. bundesliga.com takes a closer look at their firepower…
1) Looking pretty Schick up front
Werner has been Leipzig's top scorer for each of their four Bundesliga seasons since promotion to Germany's top flight in 2016, and bettered his previous best mark of 21 goals by seven this season.
For the vast majority of those four Bundesliga campaigns Leipzig's attack was something of a throwback, Werner and Yussuf Poulsen playing little and large up front in a 4-4-2. Nagelsmann is a forward-thinking coach, however, and Patrik Schick - signed on loan from Roma at the start of the season - gave them a fittingly modern look in attack.
Watch: Schick opened his Leipzig account in the Matchday 13 win over Paderborn
Following the turn of the year, the Czech international scored 10 league goals at a rate of one every 130 minutes. Werner was generally shifted deeper and wider with Schick on the field, and while his own 10-goal haul at a rate of one every 138 minutes in 2020 is still admirable given his starting position, this serves as Exhibit A in the case of RB Leipzig goals vs. Timo Werner.
Poulsen can also do a similar job to Schick. Standing at 6'3", the great Dane is an even more hulking physical presence up top, but that's not to say he's a battering ram alone. Last season, the most recent in which he featured regularly, Poulsen scored 15 goals - just one fewer than Werner.
2) The supporting cast
In Christopher Nkunku and Marcel Sabitzer, Leipzig also boast two of the best attacking midfielders in Europe. Frenchman Nkunku has scored five and assisted 13 this term; Austrian Sabitzer has nine and seven in those columns, and the continent really sat up and took notice after his wondergoal against Zenit Saint Petersburg in the Champions League group stages. His four in the competition are also as many as Werner managed.
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The fact that both have played up front earlier in their careers should surprise nobody who has watched the way they can find space and strike the ball, although Nagelsmann does not have to crowbar them into the team. The prospect of Schick leading the line with Nkunku and Sabitzer tucked in behind is a mouth-watering one indeed, and one that promises goals.
The addition of Hwang Hee-chan is also an exciting one indeed. The South Korean plundered 11 goals and 13 assists for Red Bull Salzburg in the Austrian Bundesliga last season. Alongside Dani Olmo, who hit form towards the end of the campaign, Leipzig are positively spoiled for choice in the final third behind a target man.
Another alternative is Ademola Lookman. The young Englishman has only started one game since returning from Everton at the start of the season, but the reason Leipzig were so keen to bring him back was that he scored his five goals on loan in the 2017/18 season at a rate of one every 115 minutes. More minutes could now be his.
3) Not-so-secret weapons in the U19s
Of course, Leipzig might go shopping this summer, but a look at who has been doing what below the first-team picture shows that they may already have a future superstar or two in their youth ranks.
Dennis Borkowski only turned 18 in January, yet he has lit up the U19 Bundesliga this season, plundering 11 goals in 16 games, 14 of which were starts. A youth international with two goals in three games for Michael Feichtenbeiner's Germany U16s, Borkowski is filling out into his 6-foot frame and beginning to resemble Schick.
Not yet quite as big or prolific as his teammate, Norway youth international Noah Holm has nonetheless scored seven goals in 18 games, of which 15 have been starts.
Nagelsmann's attacking Plan A may have left for the English Premier League, but Plans B, C and perhaps even D have the firepower to strike fear into any opponent at the upcoming tournament in Lisbon.
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