Alarming! Celtics will now have to shell out a big sum to recruit Balikwisha since  Royal Antwerp has just raised the asking price significantly following the expression of fresh interest from two major teams. But the issue now stands: Is he really worth the increased cost?

Brendan Rodgers has already signed goalkeepers Viljami Sinisalo and Kasper Schmeichel this summer. With less than two weeks until the Premiership start against Kilmarnock at Celtic Park, Rodgers is reportedly increasing his interest in additional targets, notably Antwerp’s Belgian attacker Balikwisha. Belgian journalist Sacha Tavolieri first reported Celtic’s interest in the youngster last week, and the most recent reports indicate Rodgers has now made personal meetings with the player.

This scout report will examine in-depth at the former Belgian youth international, examining his data and playing style to see what he would contribute to the Celtic assault if a move occurred.

Profile of the player Prior to joining Standard Liege, where he made his professional debut in September 2020, Balikwisha began his youth career at Anderlecht.

After just one season with Standard Liege, the attacker from Gent signed a £4 million contract to join Antwerp in July 2021. Since then, he has made over 120 appearances, contributing 14 assists and 25 goals. Ten times capped for Belgium’s under-21 squad, Balikwisha led Antwerp to a domestic double in 2022–2023 and, in 44 games last season, scored ten goals and assisted on eight more. Additionally, he secured group-stage football last year with a crucial Champions League goal in their play-off match against AEK Athens.

Data analysis The chart below can help paint a picture of Balikwisha’s playing style. It compares him to other wingers and central attacking midfielders (minimum 1,000 minutes played) in the Belgian Pro League last season using Wyscout per-90 data converted into percentile ranks.

Balikwisha has been used primarily as a left wing in Antwerp’s preferred 4-2-3-1, but he has also been deployed in several other positions. He played 1,547 of his total 2,778 league minutes on the left wing, but showed his versatility by playing 779 minutes as a central attacking midfielder/central midfielder, 351 on the right, and 101 at center-forward.

Threat to the goal

Although his outstanding work rate off the ball may be what most stands out, Balikwisha offers a lot going forward as well, including a strong goal threat. Balikwisha consistently finishes high-quality opportunities, as the data analysis also demonstrates. His shot map below further emphasizes this tendency. The figure, which maps Balikwisha’s shots over the previous year, demonstrates how he enters high-quality zones between the posts near the six-yard line. Though most of his minutes are spent on the left wing, he does prefer to focus most of his efforts on the left, with the majority of those coming from within the box. He does, in fact, much rather cut in on his stronger right.

Creation of chances

Despite being more of a goal threat than a creator (he also scored more goals than he did the previous season), Balikwisha is nonetheless capable of producing work that is reasonably inventive. He has contributed 36 shot assists in total throughout the past calendar year, as seen in the map below, valued at a total xA of 5.98. This results in a respectable 0.16 xA average quality of chance offered per shot assist.

Carrying a ball As demonstrated by the previous example, one of Balikwisha’s advantages is his capacity to carry balls. Because of his low center of gravity and ability to make fast spins to lose his man, he is challenging to defend against one-on-one. He is described in more detail on his ball-carrying abilities in the graphic below. A display of dribbles in the