Four loan spells are enough… Van Buren now has the best chance to succeed in Slavia
If you had asked the management of Liberec, or even the player himself, in mid-December, they would have told you that things are moving on happily. A few days before Christmas, however, Slavia ordered and recalled Dutch forward Mick Van Buren (30) from loan. As the second best scorer and the fifth most productive player in the league, he should help overtake Viktoria Plzeň. But he could also go to host for the fifth time…
He has been Slavia’s regular player for six and a half years, the only senior in the current squad is the long-term injured captain Jan Bořil. Nevertheless, in the last three years, Mick van Buren played only eighteen competitive matches in red and white. In short, he guested round and round, four times in total. But you can say it paid off.
After the last one in Slovan Liberec, he returns to Slavia as the second best scorer and the fifth most productive player in the league.
Nine goals, two assists. On top of the hat-trick in the round of 16 of the MOL Cup Sigma in a 4:1 win.
“In Liberec, they play a center forward, for example before in Budějovice I played more from the wing. I did well there too, but I didn’t have the numbers like now. I think that’s the biggest difference,” Van Buren tried to explain his lauf after the fall.
Vital, as he himself says.
“When I was still in Esbjerg, Denmark, I scored ten goals in half a year, but now I’m older and have more experience. I think I’m really in shape now,” he reports.
“There were nineteen boys running on the field and one completely shot, far from everyone,” coach Roman Nádvorník recalls of the December match in the winter Tipsport league. His Táborsko met Liberec, they got six goals from him, two from Van Buren, who only came on the field in the second half.
Everyone could still think that the Dutchman would finish the whole season in the north. After all, even he himself assumed it after the cup win over Sigma.
“I haven’t heard from Slavia, so I think I’ll stay here. We start on the second of January, we have to prepare, that’s what I know now. I’m very happy to be here, I’ve said it many times. I think that the best will stay here for me, the team is great, everything works,” I say to myself with satisfaction.
However, the needs of the mother Slavia were more important now, especially since they had the option to interrupt the loan at this time.
“Mick performed great in Liberec, he is productive, he was one of the best offensive players in the league. He knows what Slavia means, he has shown great progress,” coach Jindřich Trpišovský explained on the club’s website.
With Van Buren, he offers to expand into the offense, but he will be there with the arrival of Mojmír Chytil from Sigmapossibly Emmanuel Yeboah from Cluj big mela.
Liberec – Jablonec: Van Buren ran onto a great cross into the box and increased the score to 2:0
By the way, it was during the negotiations about Chytil that the Sigma manager Ladislav Minář should have expressed a wish that, in addition to money, he would like to take the Dutchman on loan as a replacement. He didn’t walk…
In Slavia, he could get more space on the right wing, where David Douděra and Lukáš Masopust have alternated so far.
Van Buren’s application of weapons became his strength in the fall in a serious opponent, where he was closer from the “nine” position. He got almost thirty percent shooting success, that will be his trump card now. If we consider that out of 25 dribbles twice, he managed 13 in half a season, which can also be affected by the change of position, it is not his obvious advantage, the wing-moving player tends to have good numbers in the same period.
So far, his highlight in Slavia has been a goal in the round of 16 of the Europa League during the promotion over Sevilla in the spring of 2019, otherwise – especially after the arrival of coach Jindřich Trpišovský – he has mostly substituted. And then he hosted. Den Haag, Dynamo Budejovice twice, most recently Liberec.
In Slavia, however, before the spring part of the season, he has perhaps the best prerequisites to finally make a real impact.