The striker who left Rennes for Stuttgart at the start of the year is an early season sensation in Germany, where he has already scored two hat-tricks in just seven league games.
The top scorer in the five major European championships is neither Kylian Mbappé, nor Robert Lewandowski, nor Erling Haaland, but Serhou Guirassy. With 13 goals scored in just seven Bundesliga matches, the Guinean, trained in France and spent with Rennes and Amiens in Ligue 1, has had a thunderous start to the season with Stuttgart in Germany. However, the Guinean international had not left a lasting memory in four seasons in Ligue 1 (109 matches between 2019 and 2022).
More particularly, his last experience in Rennes had left a taste of unfinished business. Even though he managed to score 25 goals in two seasons with the Breton club, the latter left without being retained after being criticized for his lack of efficiency and his nonchalance. “He had gotten used to playing in dominated teams. In Rennes, he played in a dominant team which had more control over the gameexplains Mathieu Le Scornet, who knew him at Stade Rennais in 2020-2021, when he was Julien Stéphan’s assistant. The spaces were small in front, we logically went through the sides, whereas he likes to participate in the construction and then finish.”
Full confidence
Recruited to take the Breton club to a new milestone, just as it was preparing to play its very first Champions League campaign, Serhou Guirassy quickly found himself in a restrictive role, letting his head play do the talking ( he measures 1m87) on crosses. “He scored a few [de cette façon] but the volume was substantial. The ratio was not good”, analyzes Le Scornet. In Stuttgart, the 27-year-old striker is having fun and showing the full extent of his palette, that of a much more complete player than his French reputation would lead you to believe.
Long shots, hooks into the box, little dives… His 13 achievements in the championship are as pretty as they are varied. “I feel full of confidence, I make the right decisions. When I have to hit, I hit. When I have to stab, I sting. When I have to pass, I pass. I feel very strong”said the person concerned in the columns of Le Parisien [article payant] Friday. Enough to become the leader of the sensation team of the season in Germany, currently second in the championship even though it had to compete in the play-offs to maintain its position last spring.
No one had bet on such a start to the season from him, but the players and coaches that Franceinfo: sport interviewed were not so surprised by his success. Philippe Hinschberger, who gave him his first professional minutes with Laval in 2013, would like to note that “even just being on the sidelines of a Ligue 2 club at 17 still confers a certain quality”. Antony Robic was his teammate from 2013 to 2015 remembers a young player “skillful in front of goal and in his style of play, he was already someone who dared, like an experienced player.”.
Humility and questioning
“I took the international scouting (recruiter) training two or three years ago. There were two tests. In the first, I had to take a team. In the second, a player. It’s like if I was in the recruitment unit of a club. I had recruited Serhou in Lens. Given that I had to develop my choice, I explained that I had already played with him. I saw what he did in Rennes too. For me, he was a player who could have the reputation of a great European player. We will say that I was not too wrong.” adds the one who currently wears the colors of Borgo in National 2. In the same style, just before the summer transfer window, the former legend of German football Lothar Matthäus had suggested to Bayern Munich to recruit Guirassy rather than Randal Kolo Muani or Harry Kane in an interview for Bild [article en Allemand].
Witnesses to his first steps as a professional footballer all speak of a player “mature” for his age, “soft” And “laid”. “I’m not necessarily surprised by how his career has gone. When he started with us, we felt that if he fell he was able to get back up. In football, the most important thing is the mind.” notes another teammate who witnessed his Laval debut, Anthony Gonçalves. The experienced tango does not have “a juicy anecdote” on young Guirassy, whom he describes as someone “very calm and very respectful, who blends in quite easily with the group”.
“He arrived with the desire to play. They say that attackers don’t defend, but not him. After six matches, against Nîmes, his desire to do too much cost him three matches of suspension because of a defensive gesture”
Christophe Pélissier, coach of Serhou Guirassy in Amiensat Franceinfo: sport
Christophe Pélissier lured him to Amiens in 2019, the club where he revealed himself. “For a coach, having a player like Serhou is 200% beneficial. He’s a player who already in a locker room gives a lot of good humor and a great state of mind.”, recalls the current coach of AJ Auxerre. Mathieu Le Scornet remembers daily discussions “frank” with his former striker when he was unsuccessful at Rennes. The digestion of the Rennes period is over.“He is someone who is not afraid to question himself”supports Anthony Gonçalves.
His national team coach, Kaba Diawara, has however identified an area of progress. “I see him in the selection: he always gives his thumbs up, even if his teammate misses his cross. He is always encouraging his partners. He will benefit from being a little more selfish if he wants to go very high”, the former Bordeaux and Nice striker advised him in an interview with TV5 Monde. But that doesn’t sound like Serhou Guirassy, more like the type to temper in The Parisian : “I know that I have the qualities to do very well but the high level is judged on regularity. I haven’t set a precise objective. I’m living it to the fullest.”