Player Focus: Can Belfodil Emulate his Former Inter Icons?

When Ishak Belfodil moved to Italy 18 months ago, fans joked about his surname. “Belfodil?” they asked. “Who or what is that? It sounds like an antibiotic.” Signed by Inter last week, you could say that after finishing ninth in Serie A last season and not qualifying for any European competition for the first time since 1999 that they needed a trip to the pharmacy to cure their ills.

Whether Belfodil is precisely what the doctor ordered or not - a dose of the good stuff or some bad medicine - is one of the topics of discussion in and around Milan’s bars this summer.

Born in Algeria, Belfodil’s family moved to France when he was seven. They lived in Élancourt, outside of Paris, an experience he has likened to growing up in one of the banlieue. Things were hard.

“You live badly,” Belfoldil told La Gazzetta dello Sport. “The houses are awful. There’s misery. Kids [with a background like his own] don’t see a future for themselves. I always had football in mind and this saved me although I did also finish my school studies and graduate online. Still many of my friends from that time are either unemployed or in a bad way.”

One was tragically killed in a road accident when Belfodil was 15. “I understood then that life is short and you mustn’t throw it away.” He turned to religion. He began to read the Koran and has gone to the Mosque ever since to pray five times a day.

If faith helped Belfodil through life in Élancourt than football also got him out of there. He was spotted by one of Lyon’s scouts and offered a place in their academy. Because of his origin and the position he played up front as a striker, Belfodil was compared with Karim Benzema. Though flattered by it, he personally didn’t see the similarity. Standing at 6ft 3in and weighing 13st 7lb, Belfodil is taller than Benzema and his game is a little less mobile.  

“Karim isn’t as big as me,” he explained. “He’s shorter and he moves more on the pitch although I no longer play only looking at the goal and am willing to run without the ball if this creates space for a teammate. My model centre-forward is Ronaldo, the Brazilian one. For me, he is the best of all-time. Today I watch Ibrahimovic a lot.” Both incidentally would become idols at Inter.

A lot still has to happen for Belfodil to emulate either of them at his new club. He broke into the first team at Lyon as a teenager but unlike Benzema he couldn’t make a regular place within it his own, at least not with Lisandro Lopez and Bafetimbi Gomis ahead of him in the pecking order. So in the spring of 2012, Belfodil was loaned to Bologna.

His arrival coincided with a great run. Fighting relegation at the time, they finished ninth. Belfodil, however, had little or nothing to do with it. He made just eight appearances and didn’t score once. How come he was barely used? Was Belfodil not ready? Were Bologna reluctant to take a chance on a youngster at a delicate time.

“Perhaps both,” Belfodil said. “I didn’t understand it at all. They said I had a lot of quality in training but then I never played. Maybe they were afraid of throwing a young player who was in his first season in Serie A into a team fighting for survival. Let’s say, they risked little.”

On the few occasions he did get on the pitch at the Renato Dall’Ara, Belfodil did manage to do enough to arouse the curiosity of Parma. He moved an hour or so up the road to play for them at the beginning of last season replacing Sebastian Giovinco who returned to Juventus after a 15-goal season.

It was there, at the Ennio Tardini, that bit-by-bit Belfodil started to realise his potential. He didn’t take long to get off the mark. Belfodil found the net against Chievo in Parma’s first home game of the campaign. He then set up Amauri’s winner in a victory over Sampdoria and his performance on Roma’s visit to the Tardini a week later had a bit of everything. He scored, assisted a teammate and got sent off. That wouldn’t be the only time Belfodil’s temperament came into question. For instance, his next goal away to Lazio caused controversy.

Nicola Sansone had gone down in the area and won a penalty for Parma. His teammate Marco Marchionni picked up the ball and walked towards the spot when he was confronted by Belfodil who petulantly demanded that he take it. ‘You better not miss, then,’ Marchionni probably thought. Except Belfodil did. Albano Bizzarri saved it but couldn’t hold onto the ball. Fortunately for Belfodil it fell to him and he made amends, blasting it into the net only to then shush and insult his bench.

After the match, Parma coach Roberto Donadoni warned him that if he wasn’t careful fans would associate him with action like that first and his goals second. “Zinedine Zidane had a great career,” he said, “but people only remember the headbutt he gave Materazzi in the World Cup final.”

Belfodil to his credit apologised and quickly put it behind him. It was the start of a hot streak through the winter months. That’s when he really stoked things up, scoring five goals in eight games. Juventus wanted him. Napoli did too. They were of course trained by Walter Mazzarri, Inter’s new coach who is said to be a big admirer. At the time, though, nothing came of their interest and when the transfer window closed in the spring, Belfodil was still a Parma player.

He was disappointed. Some claimed he sulked. There were other tantrums.

During Parma’s 3-0 defeat at home to Udinese in April, Belfodil got embroiled in a row with his captain Alessandro Lucarelli. “I didn’t like his attitude in a particular game situation,” Lucarelli said. “Ishak has to understand that it takes humility to reach a certain level. The advice that I give and not just to him is to put yourself at the service of your teammates and improve. Follow positive examples and you’ll go far.” Donadoni also suggested he should make more effort to get on with his teammates.

Did Parma feel a little let down by Belfodil in the second half of the season? Perhaps, but opponents were also paying more attention to him. Belfodil went an unlucky 13 matches without scoring. During that time he played a full 90 minutes only three times. His drought ended on the final day of the campaign with a goal and an assist against relegated Palermo. And so, Belfodil finished it with eight and four respectively.

Potential is there, that much is clear. Salvatore Bagni, the former Napoli midfielder during the days of Maradona, who brought Belfodil to Bologna while director of sport at the Renato Dall’Ara, told La Gazzetta dello Sport: “He has the physique of a No.9. He moves in the spaces like a second striker and he can burn you in a one against one like a wide player.”

Belfodil could become a complete striker capable of playing across the line, not only as a finisher but as a target-man-creator too. Of players under the age of 23 in Serie A, only Erik Lamela, Stevan Jovetic, Lorenzo Insigne and Adem Ljajic made more assists. Each of them are either wide players or started out their career playing as No.10s before evolving into a false 9 in Jo-Jo’s case. Belfodil is closer to the traditional conception of a striker than any of them, which makes him interesting.

Incidentally, his goal tally ranked eighth among players under the age of 23 in Serie A, but 13 of the 25 players who fall into that category had more shots per game than he did [1.5]. When Belfodil did get a sight on goal, his efforts often found the target. His shot accuracy was 52%, a figure higher than anyone under the age of 23 to have played more than 10 games in Serie A and the fifth highest in the division overall.  Of the seven players to have scored more goals than him under the age of 23 only three - Erik Lamela, his new teammate Mauro Icardi and Luis Muriel - had a better chance conversion rate than the 16% he achieved.

One can safely assume that this will rise under Walter Mazzarri at Inter, as will Icardi’s, for he has a knack for turning occasional goal-getters into prolific scorers. Take Nicola Amoruso and Rolando Bianchi at Reggina for instance. Their goal-to-game ratios went from 0.27 and 0.04 respectively before Mazzarri to 0.44 and 0.41 with him. Other examples include Giampaolo Pazzini at Sampdoria and of course Edinson Cavani at Napoli. Their goal-to-game ratios went from 0.23 and 0.31 before Mazzarri to 0.57 and 0.75 with him.

Many have been quick to criticise Inter for the money they’ve spent on Belfodil. That’s because of the conjecture over the deal with many believing that they’ve spent 10m euro plus Antonio Cassano in exchange for only half of the Parma forward’s rights. Juventus supporters have pointed out that, since 2011, they have signed the two Andreas - Barzagli and Pirlo - Paul Pogba, Fernando Llorente and Carlos Tevez for approximately the same amount in transfer fees.

Others have highlighted that David Villa has gone to Atletico Madrid for as little as 5.1m euro. “I am sceptical,” said the former Inter striker Spillo Altobelli. “I have to be honest, when I think about strikers worthy of Inter I have the Eto’os and the Balotellis in mind, not the Belfodils. He will never be a top player, though I hope to be proven wrong.”

It’s up to Belfodil to do just that. Whether they’ve paid over the odds or not, some Interisti are encouraged by the moves made this summer. Why’s that exactly? Well, though Inter continue to ignore their academy, selling Giulio Donati and Luca Caldirola who helped get the Italy Under-21s to the final of the European Championship in Israel to Bayer Leverkusen and Werder Bremen, the team is being rejuvenated. By signing Belfodil [21] and Icardi [20], the team has added another couple of very promising young players to those already in the first team, like Juan Jesus [22] and Mateo Kovacic [19].

They’re strikers too, which is a relief. One of the lessons of last season was that Inter were short in this regard. Once Diego Milito suffered a season-ending injury in February and Rodrigo Palacio got hurt in early April, missing most of the final six weeks, the only striker they had to turn to was veteran Tommaso Rocchi. Embarrassingly Inter were so desperate they even gave a trial to John Carew. That won’t happen again.

Eight teams scored more than Inter in Serie A last season. The hope is that with Belfodil, Icardi, Palacio and a fit again Milito their attack will be one to fear again this coming season.