A look at West Ham target Said Benrahma with a scouting report from Breaking The Lines 

Since joining OGC Nice in 2013, Benrahma bounced around from various loans to Angers, Gazélec Ajaccio and LB Châteauroux before joining Brentford in 2018 for a fee believed to be in the region of £2.7 million. He’s flourished in attack for the Bees just missing out on promotion to the Premier League.

For Brentford Benrahma often starts off on the left flank, very close to the byline. The attacking tactics of the team on the counter heavily rely on players running in as many vertical channels as possible, and the Algerian does a great job of exploiting space in transition from the left flank.

From there, he progresses the ball into the final third by either cutting inside himself and then playing a pass or by continuing to drift towards the penalty area down the flank. His brilliant dribbling ability and quick change of direction help him to lose his marker and create space for himself.

If the left flank’s been occupied, Benrahma changes the direction of his movement and starts running towards the centre. Often the left back makes an overlapping run and Benrahma accommodates his movement by drifting inside.

The same thing applies when Brentford are in a steady phase of possession, and the movement of attacking group depends on the balanced occupation of zones, where every player makes his run depending on the run of his teammate.

Benrahma occupies the left flank as well as the centre, and occasionally he plays on the right flank too. Here, the winger starts off from the centre initially, when the left is occupied. The freedom of the players to take up any positions in the front three is essential to their attack, and these positional rotations make life even harder for opposition defences.

The 25-year-old is the highest volume shooter in the Championship and the majority of his shots comes from him cutting inside and shooting.

In terms of progressive passing, Benrahma is high up the statistics table in the second tier league. Due to his in-match positioning and his team’s style of play, he tends to hit the channels between the full-back and centre-back with his through balls.

He can cross with both feet, and the Algerian uses the same crossing technique almost every time. He puts in crosses that have a high arc and that stay a lot of time in the air, mainly targeting a player in the penalty area.