🇩🇪 The Bundesliga has a new star striker and it is not Harry Kane | OneFootball

Victor Boniface took 11 shots on Saturday evening.

Some teams go away from home and would be happy to manage that many. Some teams even struggle to do it when they’re playing in front of their own fans. In fact, two weekends and 18 matches into the new Bundesliga season there have been 10 cases of a team not getting 11 shots away over 90 minutes.

But Victor Boniface took 11 shots on Saturday evening.

Leading the line for Xabi Alonso’s Bayer Leverkusen side, the Nigerian striker arrived for €20.5m over the summer from Belgian outfit Union Saint-Gilloise.

At first glance, the fee raises an eyebrow. Leverkusen have spent north of €20m just six times in their history and they hadn’t done so for three years before opting for the striker who had a relatively modest record in Belgium. In his sole campaign with Saint-Gilloise, Boniface scored just seven goals in 31 Jupiler Pro League appearances. And he remains uncapped by Nigeria.

But look at the impact he had in Europe last season and a fuller picture begins to emerge.

Five goals in four Champions League qualifying matches for FK Bodø/Glimt came before his move to Belgium. There he stepped into the Europa League group stages and then the knockout rounds effortlessly, scoring six times in 10 games as Saint-Gilloise made it to the quarter-finals.

Of those strikes, two came against Union Berlin and another against Leverkusen as he caught the eye of his future employers.

He caught the eye of future rivals FC Köln too. Speaking after Bayern Munich’s capture of Harry Kane, Köln boss Steffen Baumgart said he’d rather have Leverkusen’s new star striker instead.

“From my point of view the guy is already one of the best strikers in Europe,” Baumgart said on the eve of the new Bundesliga season. “He’s 22, he’s got a great body — his development is a long way from being over, there’s a lot more to come. He delivered a top season for Saint-Gilloise in the Europa League.”

Long-term, Baumgart said, Boniface will turn out a better signing than Kane.

“I’m interested to see who has the better future.

“As the coach of Köln, it hurts to say that Bayer Leverkusen, not Bayern Munich, signed Boniface.”

Big things are being expected, then, and with Leverkusen tipped to challenge Bayern this season there’s a lot resting on the broad shoulders of the 22-year-old yet to play for his country.

But boy, does he look capable of delivering.

A Bundesliga debut against RB Leipzig brought no goal but there was an assist as the striker calmly gathered himself in the area to pick out Jeremie Frimpong for a tap-in on the opening weekend.

That was just a taste of his unselfishness and cool in the penalty area, on Saturday in Mönchengladbach there was an entire three-course meal.

Boniface’s movement, jinking in the penalty area, darting in behind, made him a constant threat at Borussia-Park. A well-worked move ended in a powerful header to open the scoring and there could have been more, with a delicate chopped effort from the edge of the area sending everyone the wrong way in the first half, only to bobble beyond the post.

Some last ditch defending denied the striker as he looked to tap-in a rebound before that break and it started to simultaneously feel like a second goal was inevitable but also like it just might not be the day for it.

As long as strikers keep getting into good positions, though, the reward almost always follows.

A run in behind after the half-time was found by Florian Wirtz and Boniface had the wherewithal to get across his marker, using that long stride and wingspan to edge himself onto the through ball before nudging it beyond Gladbach goalkeeper Jonas Omlin.

The brace was enough to earn the striker a break and his job was done when he was subbed on the 74-minute mark.

“We saw Victor’s influence,” Xabi Alonso said after the game.

“It’ll be good for us to have him. He can take on defenders, he’s a big problem for the opposition. Physically, technically, he makes runs in behind. We saw good things from him.”

On his early showings, it seems we’ll see plenty more yet.