Matchday: Henrikh Mkhitaryan greatest Armenian footballer

Matchday: Henrikh Mkhitaryan greatest Armenian footballer

PanARMENIAN.Net - The official UEFA Champions League magazine, Champions Matchday, has released an article about Armenian and Shakhtar Donetsk FC midfielder b>Henrikh Mkhitaryan.

“Voted FC Shakhtar Donetsk’s player of the season for 2011/12, Henrik Mkhitaryan is, if anything, even better this time around. The Pitmen won their first 15 league games of the season, Mkhitaryan played in 14 and scored 16 goals. It’s a barely credible statistic, particularly as he is more of a midfielder than a striker, and spent much of last season as a deep-lying creator or even the holding player. He isn’t 24 until January, yet already it seems legitimate to hail Mkhitaryan as the greatest Armenian footballer since the demise of the Soviet Union, in the pantheon alongside striker Nikita Simonyan and midfielders Eduard Markarov and Khoren Hovhannisyan

The reason he finds the net so often is that Shakhtar’s No22 can score goals of all kinds. Clinical finishes, sublime volleys from the edge of the penalty area, rapid counterattacks where he sprints clear after hovering by the shoulder of the last defender, a 360 degree turn and shot from close range – these are all in Mkhitaryan’s repertoire. He doesn’t dwell on his goals tally. To an extent, he is the beneficiary of Shakhtar’s fluid system in which centre-forward Luiz Adriano’s main role is not to score himself but to create space for the mobile trident of Mkhitaryan, Alex Teixera and Willian who play behind him,” the article reads.

He enjoys a close relationship with Mircea Lucescu, a coach who prefers to mould young talent. “It wasn’t easy for him,” says Lucescu, “but his integration was speeded up by his football intelligence. His game awareness may be his most valuable quality – that and the speed, power and technique Henrik was gifted by nature and has developed. Because of that, he’s one of the players who most consistently fulfils the tasks set by the coaching staff.”

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