Why Tani Oluwaseyi call-up could be a shrewd bit of squad building business for CanMNT
In a surprise call-up a full week after the original squad release, the Canadian men's national team announced Monday the team has added Minnesota United’s young striker Tani Oluwaseyi to the team for upcoming friendlies against the Netherlands and France.
The addition comes after the Mississauga-raised forward’s bright start to the MLS season, where he’s tallied 7 goals and 4 assists in only 15 appearances.
TANI TIME❗️
— CANMNT (@CANMNT_Official) June 3, 2024
Tani Oluwaseyi called into #CANMNT camp for June Friendlies
This a first Canada call-up for Olawuseyi who has seven goals and four assists for Minnesota United in the 2024 Major League Soccer season. https://t.co/B2OYRLxF5O pic.twitter.com/s51RcnQeGK
Oluwaseyi will join the crowded ranks of Jonathan David, Cyle Larin, Ike Ugbo, Theo Bair and Charles-Andreas Brym as an option for Jesse Marsch at the front of the line.
Who Is He?
Aw-loo-wa-shay. I think. I can’t actually find a clip of him saying it.
Oh you mean as a footballer? He’s pretty good. He played for the St. John's Red Storm in college where he was averaging nearly a goal contribution per game towards the end of his degree in business administration. He only played 2 matches in his final season, which was totally derailed by injury – it explains why he fell to 17th in the MLS draft, behind a lot of guys we’ll probably never hear about again.
The hype line right now is that he's scored at every level he’s played at, which is basically true. He did it in NCAA, and he tore it up last year at that perpetual Canadian landing spot at San Antonio FC, where he played alongside CF Montreal’s Rida Zouhir.
There’s no way you can spin his results this season as anything but brilliant. He’s effectively stolen a starting spot from a Designated Player in Teemu Pukki... and he’s behind only a footballer called Lionel Messi in goals per 90 in the league this season, too.
So is he for real?
Depends what you mean by real; as Matt Doyle put it: "The important parts of his FBRef chart are all green."
He’s getting in perfect positions to knock goals in, and then, the important part? He’s actually knocking goals in.
He’s pacey, and a cromulent ball progressor, mostly for the purposes of putting the ball into his own path for a scoring opportunity. He loves contesting aerials, and at 6’2, he wins half of them, which is quite a little more than the average forward.
Avert your gaze, now, to the scary red part of the chart. Those are his passing numbers, and they don’t remotely line up with his expected assists, which are also near the top of the league. As far as I can tell, when he does attempt them, he’s ridiculously ambitious with his final ball. They get picked off a lot, but when they don’t, they’re sitting in perfect position for someone else to do the knocking in.
Robin Lod puts it away to double the lead for @MNUFC 💪 pic.twitter.com/viAmaPF41V
— Major League Soccer (@MLS) June 2, 2024
I do question whether that can continue at this level: You can only be so brilliantly selective and wasteful simultaneously. Likewise, while Tani is not nearly so selective in his shooting, he’s sitting on a pretty ridiculous 0.58 goals per shots on target, which is probably also a little unsustainable.
But these are silly nitpicks. It is very impossible to make definitive projections with a 621 minute sample size. But the data we have now looks great, and I’m excited and you’re excited and everyone should be very excited.
The problem is... Nigerian football fans are also excited about him, too.
Dual nat!? Play him, asap!
This was a subject of fiery debate. I was fretting about Oluwaseyi, because seemingly everyone Canada can’t have inexplicably become the best versions of themselves shortly after declaring otherwise.
It's why I cringed a little when he wasn’t with the original 26-man squad, very certain the bad thing was gonna happen. Other people kindly pointed out that Nigeria have a log-jam of strikers – Victor Osimhen and Kelechi Iheanacho and Ademola Lookman and about 20 other guys to bring in before Tani.
To that point? I beg you not to tempt fate. You never know what might call on a professional footballer's soul, already living their 100th percentile dream, to keep betting on themself. The Super Eagles have capped Sunusi Ibrahim for goodness sake. They're definitely scouting Canada.
Oluwaseyi probably had a lot more work to do to get on their radar. But I for one am thankful that we took the opportunity to bring him in ASAP. And I’m thankful, too, that Tani is willing to interrupt his young career and fly himself out to Europe to take in the Canada Soccer experience.
(Now, let's cap-tie him as soon as possible!)
