Focus on Angel Di Maria: El Fideo is still hungry

With Angel Di Maria being the top assists provider in the league, the time is right to do a statistical assessment of the Argentinian. 

With football on hold in France, it's the right time to look in the rear-view mirror and contemplate all he has achieved. For Angel Di Maria, we need to rewind to 2015 to analyse the attacker's work. 

Arriving with a fanfare to Laurent Blanc's Paris Saint-Germain, to join Zlatan Ibrahimovic in attack, this big fan of Kily Gonzalez arrived with a fine CV including a Champions League success in which he was one of the major protagonists. His tattooed arms tell a story, the talent in his boots tells another. But Di Maria is a player who runs on emotion, and the city of lights offered him the second wind he needed to relaunch his career. 

In the capital, the Argentinian has more than lived up to his reputation. His dribbles and lobs, his celebrations full of love and the kilometres he covers, El Fideo continues to delight on the pitches.
The man from Rosario was the most productive player in the Paris squad in the second half of the 2018-2019 season, before stepping up the pace still further in 2019-2020. Far from having a clear run before him in the Paris attack, the thirty-something shook up the hierarchy in order to become the cornerstone of the attack "Made in Thomas Tuchel". And since his arrival, the coach has experimented with several systems, but always wants to get the n°11 on the pitch. Shifting from the right to the left, from the forward line to the midfield, the versatile Argentinian has never lost his way. 

Having been the most used player by Thomas Tuchel last season, the Argentinian is again the most called upon player in 2019-2020 with no fewer than 37 matches played in all competitions. 

And the statistics in all that?

The statistics back up his influence, 5 years on from joining. With the league season coming to a premature conclusion, Angel Di Maria has been named the top assists provider in the league with 14 assists, 6 more than any of his rivals. 14 is a record 10 games from the end of the season, since Opta have been analysing the competition (2007).

The Argentinian attacker picked up the assists award for the second time, after his 18 assists in 2015-2016, still a record in the annals of the Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP).

But the n°11 has been a consistent assists provider throughout. In total, he's got 87 assists in the Rouge et Bleu shirt. A total more than twice as big as any other player at the capital club, making him the top assists provider of the QSI era. He's got 56 assists in Ligue 1 alone since joining, some 24 more than any other player in the same period…

"In training sessions, I try rare things in order to see if they'll work in games. I say to myself that it's possible to learn new things every year. This year, for example, I've set up more goals with the outside of my foot, and when you succeed in doing that once, you try to reproduce it and it has worked in the Champions League like in Ligue 1," he told the club's official magazine.

But it's not just with the final ball that Angel Di Maria excels. The Paris attacker has found the back of the net 12 times in all competitions this season, and has scored no fewer than 81 goals since coming to Paris, making him the 9th highest scorer in Paris history... That without being a centre-forward, labelling himself a serial scorer or taking penalties. 

"It's a gift to work with a player like Angel, he's always the first player into the dressing room, he's super professional. He always works hard in training, he can play in several positions and always at a high level. He's a very important player because he makes himself necessary to the team. He plays for the team and not for his ego, and that's very important for us," said Thomas Tuchel in a press conference. 

Full of confidence, and bathed with the affection he needs, statistics that back up his implication and the responsibilities he deserves, Di Maria seems happier than ever. On the pitch his creative talents and defensive efforts underline his importance. And the icing on the cake is that with 217 matches played in the Paris shirt, Di Maria has played more games for Paris Saint-Germain than for any other club.