The two vital parts of Nicolas Jackson’s game that Unai Emery tweaked to make him a top striker | OneFootball

Unai Emery and Nicolas Jackon’s lives are set to entangle once again this weekend when Chelsea face Aston Villa.

Emery was the manager who saw the talent in Jackson when he was Villareal boss and the striker was in the B team. Kieran Gill’s excellent piece for the Daily Mail about the striker’s rise explains how Emergy guided his development:

“After a loan with Mirandes in the Spanish second division, Emery got to work, one order being that he had to stop dropping deep like a false nine. It was drilled into Jackson that he should focus on remaining a fixed No 9, letting the ball find him rather than vice versa and bursting in behind the opposition back line,” Gill writes.

That’s something we still see a lot of now – Jackson’s link up play is excellent, but he’s also too deadly on the counter and leading the line to be wasted dropping deep all the time. Right now we’ve got a great balance of the two – but we’re glad Emery encouraged him to focus on getting into the box.

Unai Emery managing Aston Villa.

Emery’s brief association changes Jackson’s path

There were other parts of the raw young striker’s game Emery had to work on:

“Emery’s teachings helped shape him as he began to learn the best ways to apply his attacking attributes, with Jackson also told to work on perfecting his composure in the penalty area.”

Composure is certainly still not his strong point, but even in the 18 months since he signed for Chelsea it’s improved a lot, and his finish last weekend was a beauty.

This Sunday, the pair face representing their new teams – and despite all the good things that Villareal did for them, neither of them would change anything about their decision to make the step up to the Premier League, where they’re both making a habit of proving people wrong.