Ryan Thomas

 

Country: New Zealand

Date of birth: 20/12/1994 (18 years old)

Place of birth: Auckland (New Zealand)

Height: 1,74m

Club career: Melville United, WaiBOP United, Ole Football Academy, PEC Zwolle (from 2013)

Current national team: New Zealand U-20

Position: winger, attacking midfielder

Preferred foot: right

Market value (by transfermarkt.de): 150,000 €  

Contract until: 30.06.2014

Similar type of player: Miroslav Stoch

 

Strengths:

– pace

– acceleration

– dribbling

– balance

– agility

– flair

– crossing

 

Style of play:

– likes to dribble

– runs with ball often

– likes to cut inside

– likes to swap flanks

 

He is best suited to playing as:

Left winger in 4-2-3-1.

 

Video:

 

Achievements:

OFC U-20 Championship 2013 winner with New Zealand.

 

League summary:

ASB Premiership 2011/2012: 13 matches/3 goals (WaiBOP United)

ASB Premiership 2012/2013: 5 matches/1 goal (WaiBOP United)

Eredivisie 2013/2014 (ongoing): 2 matches/0 goals (PEC Zwolle)

 

Description:

Thomas is considered to be one of the biggest talent in New Zealand currently. Many clubs were interested in him and he decided to further his career and moved to Netherlands, where he follows in the footsteps of Ivan Vicelich and Fred de Jong, two other notable Kiwi players to have cracked the top Dutch league. He made his league debut on 2nd November 2013 in match against giants PSV Eindhoven, in which he played very well and was generally praised by fans and experts. His position at club becoming stronger and stronger so he should break into the first eleven of Ron Jans side very soon. He is also a star of New Zealand U-20 team that won OFC U-20 Championship 2013. Few months later Ryan and his teammates participated in the FIFA U-20 World Cup 2013 in Turkey, but were simply not good enough and were eliminated already in group stage.

 

Quotes:

“His first trial game, he played against a third or fourth division team and there was 5000-6000 people there. So he was pretty excited and enjoying the atmosphere of European football. He’s definitely not going to be a millionaire on his first contract. I think he’ll be starting in the reserve team and then trying to prove himself to get a look in the first-team over the next year or so.”

(Nate Winkel – the director of Porirua-based academy Ole)

 

Football Talent Scout potential rating:

6/10   

 

Links:

Transfermarkt: http://www.transfermarkt.de/en/ryan-thomas/profil/spieler_203357.html

Soccerway: http://int.soccerway.com/players/ryan-thomas/215382/