The Weekly Take, Issue 219: The Finishing Touches to an Iconic Career

Robert Lewandowski has achieved just about everything possible over the course of his legendary football career. A two-time European Golden Shoe winner who was unjustly denied the Ballon d'Or in 2020 after leading Bayern Munich to the Champions League title in that year, Lewandowski ranks second among all Bundesliga goalscorers in league history with 312. The Pole scored 238 of those for Bayern including a mind-boggling 41 in the 2020-21 season.

Lewandowski has now begun what might be the final stages of his career by agreeing to sign for Barcelona for a transfer fee of €50 million. Lewandowski signed a three-year contract with an option for a further one-year extension. While the transfer fee may initially seem unusually low, the reality is that at 33, it remains uncertain just how many prime years Lewandowski has remaining. That being said, if Lewandowski can remain at an elite level for two to three more years, Barça are set to be a leading contender for Champions League titles during the entirety of that timespan.

Lewandowski's arrival at Camp Nou further strengthens an already stacked attack. Ferran Torres, Ansu Fati, a rejuvenated Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, and Lewandowski's fellow new arrival Raphinha already make Barça's frontline one of the most potent in world football. The addition of Lewandowski might just give Barça the undisputed best attacking unit on the planet.

Last season, Barça were not even close to winning the league. Although they finished second behind arch-rivals Real Madrid, Barça were second by the enormous margin of 13 points. One key reason for this was their relative lack of a goalscoring threat. In the 2021-22 season, Barça's leading goalscorer in La Liga was Memphis Depay (who is likely to leave the club himself during this off-season) with 12. To put this figure into perspective, Aubameyang came to Catalonia during the mid-season transfer window and had 11 in the league, almost matching Depay's full-season tally. In total, Barça scored just 68 league goals to Real's 80.

This will almost certainly change with Lewandowski in the starting line-up. Of particular note will be Fati's performance if, as expected, he once again becomes a regular starter following his recovery from a torn ACL. It is widely believed that Fati's playstyle is an excellent complement to that of Lewandowski. Should this turn out to be the case, expect another massive goal tally from the Pole - perhaps a third consecutive Golden Shoe could await.

At this point, the only "criticism" that could conceivably be levelled at Lewandowski is the (baseless) claim that "he would never be able to do it in a league other than the Bundesliga". However, those who would claim this are ignoring the fact that this isn't just any player. This is one of the greatest centre-forwards of all time. When Lewandowski is in top form, he is one of the most unstoppable offensive forces to ever step onto a football pitch and will torch any defensive scheme thrown at him.

An underrated yet almost as important element of Lewandowski's arrival at Barça will be his intangible impact on the club's younger players - some of whom may once have idolized him. It's certainly a possibility that promising youngsters such as Fati, Torres, and Pedri might raise their game simply by being in the presence of a legend like Lewandowski every day. It could be because they would not want to let him down or perhaps avoid looking bad in front of him, but either way, these effects cannot be understated and could play key roles in driving Barça towards a first Champions League title since 2015.

Of course, there is one key way in which this transfer could end up backfiring. As was mentioned earlier, Lewandowski is now 33. He is at an age when most strikers begin to decline - some much more dramatically than others. If Lewandowski ends up being one of them, Barça might just end up worse off compared to where they were before.

That being said, Lewandowski is in no way just "any ordinary striker". When a player like Lewandowski is there for the taking, any club with the means to do so should make the move. Barça have done just that and are thus likely to reap the rewards.

It looks as though fun times at Camp Nou lie ahead.

The Weekly Take, Issue 116: Robert Lewandowski? No, "Robbed" Lewandowski

In an announcement which has caused shockwaves across the landscape of elite football, L'Équipe, the Paris-based football magazine responsible for the awarding of the Ballon d'Or, stated that the honour will not be presented in 2020 due to the extreme circumstances caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

While such a response is perfectly understandable given all that has happened, there is one player who will undoubtedly be extremely dismayed about this decision. A player who has had by far the best season of his career. A player who, over the last two to three years, has made the leap from just being among the leading players of this generation to being a true all-time great. A player whom not many would have selected as a potential Ballon d'Or winner just a year ago, but would likely have claimed the award had it been presented this year.

That player is none other than Bayern Munich legend (yes, we can call him that now) Robert Lewandowski.

Lewandowski led Bayern to a come-from-behind Bundesliga title victory by scoring an astonishing 34 league goals. The Pole claimed the European Golden Shoe by doing so. Lewandowski's 34 goals were the most in the Bundesliga since Dieter Müller netted the same number in 1977. Over the past decade, only four players have scored that many over the course of a major European league campaign - Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Luis Suárez, and Gonzalo Higuaín. What makes Lewandowski's achievement even more impressive is the fact that he did in the Bundesliga. Unlike other leagues which have seasons running for 38 matches, Germany's top flight uses a 34-match schedule. Adjusting for this factor, Lewandowski would have scored 38 league goals in a 20-team league.

Lewandowski has also been killing it in the Champions League as well. He has already amassed 11 goals in the tournament even though the round of 16 is yet to be completed. It is likely that he will add to his tally in the second leg of Bayern's tie against an overmatched Chelsea. If Bayern make a deep Champions League run, there is a distinct possibility that Lewandowski's season could reach historic levels. This will probably happen as the Bavarian club are currently the favourites to win it all, thanks in no small part to Lewandowski's outstanding play.

Lewandowski hasn't just been putting up empty numbers. His goals have directly translated to wins for Bayern. He was the scorer of over a third of Bayern's league goals this past season. Such was his level of marksmanship that he scored more goals than Jadon Sancho of Borussia Dortmund and Wout Weghorst of VfL Wolfsburg, the third- and fourth-highest goalscorers in the league, combined. Take away his 34 goals and Bayern would likely not even come close to defending their Bundesliga crown.

While Lewandowski's absence would not have had quite the same effect on Bayern's Champions League campaign owing to their relatively easy path thus far, it will nevertheless be Lewandowski who will serve as the focal point of Bayern's attempt to win European football's most prestigious honour for the sixth time.

Such has been Lewandowski's dominance this season that on many an occasion, teams which play against Bayern centre their entire game plan around stopping Lewandowski. He has become a game-changer on the level of the likes of Ronaldo and Messi in their primes. Not even the most die-hard fan of Die Roten could have seen this coming when the club signed Lewandowski from arch-rivals Borussia Dortmund in 2014.

Obviously, Lewandowski has become one of the greatest centre-forwards of all time. If he were to lead Bayern to Champions League glory this season, it would elevate his legacy even further to one of an inner-circle legend. What's more, if it turns out that his missing out on the Ballon d'Or ends up fueling him, every other team ought to be put on notice because Robert Lewandowski might just be about to unleash hell on Europe's leading clubs in a manner which has seldom been seen before.

The Weekly Take, Issue 39: Poland’s Finest Reaches 50

Heading into a Champions League match against Benfica, Bayern Munich had been in the midst of an alarming slump. Their results had been so poor that recently-hired head coach Niko Kovač already found himself at risk of being fired.

However, the Bavarian team broke their slump in emphatic fashion, hammering the Portuguese club 5-1 and securing the first seed in their group.

Another notable fact about the game was that Robert Lewandowski’s first of two goals made him the seventh player in Champions League history to score 50 goals in Europe’s leading club football tournament.

What makes this feat even more impressive is that Lewandowski now has 51 goals in 77 Champions League games.

To put this into perspective, legendary strikers such as Samuel Eto’o, Filippo Inzaghi, Didier Drogba, and Thierry Henry have all played more Champions League games than the Polish legend (yes, we can call him a legend at this point), but none have scored as many goals.

Despite his obvious goalscoring prowess, Lewandowski has arguably become the most overlooked football superstar in today’s game.

When discussing who the best strikers in the world are, after the obvious picks of Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi, most would cite names such as Kylian Mbappé, Mohamed Salah, Luis Suárez, Harry Kane, and Neymar, among others.

One player who is frequently forgotten in these discussions is Lewandowski – a real shame considering all that he has accomplished and the true big-ticket star he really is.

As of the writing of this post, Lewandowski has played 650 career games for club and country, scoring 403 goals. Of these, 240 of them have come in high-leverage games, which I define as games in a major domestic league, the Champions League, or an international tournament.

To put this into perspective, when comparing these numbers to some of today’s other elite strikers of around the same age, Lewandowski’s numbers look even more impressive.

Sergio Agüero has played 688 games and scored 374 goals, of which 267 have been in high-leverage games.

Edinson Cavani has 379 in 652 games, with 158 being on the biggest stages.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang has netted 242 in 496 games. Of these, 139 were scored in high-leverage games.

Luis Suárez has 436 in 685, with 225 in the most important games.

Only Suárez has more career goals, while only Agüero has scored more in high-leverage games. Furthermore, both have played more career games than Lewandowski.

Lewandowski has also been the Bundesliga’s top goalscorer three times over the last five seasons.

He is one of 24 players to have ever accomplished this feat in a major European league.

The others to have done so include names such as Gerd Müller, Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Thierry Henry, Alfredo di Stefano, and Michel Platini. Thus, as I mentioned earlier, Lewandowski is already among the all-time greats.

His goals also translate to wins, as Lewandowski has helped his teams to seven league titles and three domestic cups.

As a pure finisher, there is arguably no better in the world today than the man from Warsaw. The clearest evidence of this was his legendary five-goal performance for Bayern Munich against Wolfsburg in 2015. In that match, Lewandowski came off the bench to score five goals in just nine minutes, an all-time record. To cap it off, his fifth goal was a spectacular bicycle kick from the edge of the penalty area.

But beyond all of this, one other thing is clear:

Robert Lewandowski is the greatest footballer to ever come out of Poland.

Through the years, Poland has produced some great players.

Zbigniew Boniek. Kazimierz Deyna. Grzegorz Lato. Jerzy Dudek. Łukasz Piszczek.

Lewandowski has surpassed every single one of them.

The player with the best case among those I just mentioned is Boniek, but Boniek was frequently on stacked teams throughout his career – he played for a Juve team containing Platini, Marco Tardelli, and Paolo Rossi, as well as a Poland team with Deyna and Lato.

That Poland team reached two World Cup semifinals. Just think what Lewandowski could have done with such teammates.

Maybe it’s the fact that his playstyle is not flashy. Maybe it’s the fact that he’s from Poland. Or, it could be the fact that he plays for Bayern Munich, a club often overlooked as well.

But right now, there seems to be no stopping the Bayern superstar.