For Sportsthe former coach of the Girondins de Bordeaux, Gustavo Poyet, spoke about Jules Koundé, and in particular his qualities such as his understanding of the game.
“He understands the game and that’s fundamental, but most of the time he does what’s simple, and in today’s football that’s the most complicated. People want to complicate everything, you know what I mean? They don’t want it to be simple. And he does the simple things very well. If he can make a pass the first time, he makes it the first time. He doesn’t do four hits before passing it to the same person. The first thing to do is simple, but people don’t want to let go of the ball. Two keys, three keys, ten keys! And he does it naturally because he understands the game. With less, he does a lot more”.
The current coach of Greece also mentioned his aerial game, while he is not very tall.
“It is true that he is not very tall, but look at his explosiveness. He has incredible leg power. He also has an advantage: he likes basketball, he likes the NBA. It has the characteristic of the basketball player’s double step rhythm. He has the power to get the ball. That’s what he’s had since he was little and that’s what he does with his physical power. He is a very powerful jumper. We worked on set pieces… more than tactically, we were looking for aggression to win situations in the opponent’s box and it was impressive to see it… The ball was still going to Jules! He had that jump timing and that basketball player thing that you don’t know how, but they always get the rebound. It’s also something quite natural, but it’s reinforced by basketball. I know he loves it. If he is in training and he sees a basket, he will play at 100%. If he sees a basket, he shoots. Of course, I tell you”.
