With a young team and a new manager, RC Strasbourg struggled to start the season, but have won four wins in a row across all competitions ahead of tomorrow’s match against Marseille. Key to that resurgence has been a change in tactics, but also the standout play of Kévin Gameiro, with the veteran striker a steadying influence at his boyhood club.
Now 36, Kévin Gameiro joined Strasbourg in 2004, at the age of 17, and shortly thereafter made his professional debut. Despite suffering a relegation with the Alsace side, he quickly impressed and even became a French youth international before decamping to Lorient.
With Les Merlus, his career blossomed as he finished second in the scoring charts in 2010-11 with 22 goals and earned a subsequent move to Paris Saint-Germain, where helped the capital side win their first title of the QSI era. The arrivals of Edinson Cavani and Zlatan Ibrahimovic meant that his playing time would be limited, though, and he left for Spain.
A successful spell with Sevilla was followed with time at Atletico Madrid and Valencia, before a rebuilding project with Los Che hastened his departure in 2021, returning to Racing.
💪 Kévin + Ângelo 💪 pic.twitter.com/k52YCZWr61
— Racing Club de Strasbourg Alsace English (@RCSA_English) August 26, 2023
He’s largely operated in the shadows since his return, despite reaching double figures in each of the last two seasons. Ludovic Ajorque and Habib Diallo have caught most of the headlines for the club, but with his two fellow strikers departing, he would be both an important presence on the pitch and off it, demonstrating the values and importance of hard work to his young teammates, some of whom were infants when he started his career.
A player with more than 700 appearances as a professional, Gameiro’s attitude and professionalism, as well as his burgeoning relationships with his team’s young attackers have been vital to his team’s upturn in form, notably his connections with Emanuel Emegha and Chelsea loanee Ângelo Gabriel. Despite his relatively small frame, he has shown himself to be an effective attacking fulcrum, readily bringing others into play and leading the press, his example going a long way to settle the team’s early-season butterflies, while closing to within one goal of 100 for his Ligue 1 career.
🎙️ Kevin Gameiro: "With Ema, things are getting better and better. Our relationship and connection on the pitch is not yet completely settled. There are things that we work on in training, others that are innate. I am in a role where I run a lot more but I have fun."#SB29RCSA pic.twitter.com/eP5vC5gCHc
— Racing Club de Strasbourg Alsace English (@RCSA_English) December 5, 2023
