Exclusive: Talking stats and France with Wolfsburg's Maxence Lacroix
France boss Didier Deschamps is not short on young, quality centre-back options. William Saliba, Dayot Upamecano, Jules Kounde and Benoit Badiashile were all included in the national team in the September international break, with Upamecano, at 23, the oldest of the quartet. Competition, then, is rife for spots at the heart of the defence for Les Bleus.
There is another, though, who is yet to be handed a call up, and it's surely only a matter of time before Deschamps casts a watchful eye over to Wolfsburg. Maxence Lacroix has been a regular for the France youth team setups, and the next logical step is for Deschamps to give the 22-year-old the call sooner rather than later. "It's a big level if you play for your national team," Lacroix told WhoScored when asked if seeing defenders his age handed a chance for France, and if that gives the youngster encouragement to win the trust of the 53-year-old.
That being said, Lacroix remains grounded on his national team hopes, and himself admits that there are areas to his game that do need refining if he is to make the step up. "They have a lot of qualities. I can watch them, and me, and compare why they are in the national team," Lacroix stated when asked what he has to do to get that call from Deschamps. "I like this challenge, to say, 'okay, I think I can play in a national team and I need to work on my qualities'. I think I need some more concentration, more things to be at this level," the centre-back went on to say, and this level-headedness will certainly stand him in good stead as he seeks to break into the France setup.
Certainly, Lacroix is viewed as the archetypal modern day centre-back. He looks to get the ball on the deck and carry the ball out from the back rather than being used primarily to protect the Wolfsburg goal. Defenders nowadays are expected to be be able to instigate attacks from the back, and Lacroix fits the mould. Indeed, of the 149 players to have attempted 50 or more dribbles since the start of the 2020/21 Bundesliga season, Lacroix has the best dribble success rate (85.2%) in the division. No wonder, then, he has developed a statistically calculated WhoScored style of play of 'likes to dribble'.
"I have the pace and I have good feet, and yeah, I like to dribble," Lacroix said when asked on the desire to play on the front foot, something that stems from his days playing football growing up. "We play a lot on a smaller pitch when we were young," he added, with these tight spaces meaning you need to be able to breeze past an opponent for the good of the team, and he has carried this quality into senior football, and this in the process has helped boost his reputation.
It's not just his ability to carry the ball out from the back that has drawn admirers, but his distribution too. A range of passing is another way to set his team on the front foot, which Lacroix does superbly. A return of 5.8 accurate long balls per game is the third most of centre-backs in the Bundesliga this season and his vision is another key asset for Wolfsburg. "Right now we need defenders to play good passes. The new generation of central defender, they play [the ball] a lot."
On the ball, Lacroix is more than capable of opening up new angles to aid the Wolves, be it to ghost past an opponent, or pick out a teammate from range to help spread the play to the wings and go more direct if required. Off the ball, today's centre-backs rely heavily on superb positional awareness and their reading of the game, rather than the rough and ready approach of defenders in the past. It's another quality that Lacroix excels in, noted in that he has developed a statistically calculated WhoScored strength of 'ball interception' and it's for good reason, too.
Since the start of the 2020/21 campaign, only Konstantinos Mavropanos (146) has made more interceptions than Lacroix (138), and this proactive approach is one that the latter prefers. "I like to be clever and I like to read the game," Lacroix said when asked why he favours this style. "I think I have this quality to read the situation, and it's for that I think I made a lot of interceptions."
For a centre-back who prefers to carry the ball out from the back, and is capable of picking out a teammate from distance, the style of defending certainly suits Lacroix. Given the willingness to help turn defence into attack, and the approach to keeping opponents at bay, it's no wonder that the official Bundesliga website likened Lacroix to Rio Ferdinand, the Frenchman's elegance both on and off the ball a key reason why his stock is so high, both in Germany and abroad.
While there is plenty of competition for spots in Deschamps' France squad, it's only a matter of time before Lacroix wins that first senior cap. The World Cup may come too soon for the Wolfsburg star, but the future remains bright for Lacroix, who despite the lack of international recognition, remains one of the hottest young defensive talents on the continent.
