A successful striker needs the little extra in his head, says Lewandowski

Berlin, Germany | Xinhua | Robert Lewandowski is determined to continue his current highly-flying form.

Being awarded Europe’s most prolific goal-scorer (41 league goals) of the 2020-21 season, the 33-year-old European Golden Shoe winner announced to set new goals for the last years of his career.

“To stay at the top over a longer time is the biggest challenge a footballer can face,” the best male footballer in the world in 2020 said.

The Polish team captain added having changed his game approach has made him reach new heights.

The Bayern striker said he has reached the best time of his career. “At the moment, I am the assumedly completest Lewandowski of all times,” the spearhead commented.

He feels somehow having reached the peak of his career and hit the level he always wanted to get to.

“I always wanted to be the completest striker of modern times. I have no problems playing in different tactical systems. I just tried to get to a top-level developing my right and left foot aside of my heading,” the 2020 treble winner said.

Turning into a team player has made him improve his mental state, he said. A team can play without a striker, but a striker entirely depends on his team’s efforts in his perspective.

Skipping his lone wolves attitude opened doors to a new level “as I proved you can collect success this way.”

Over the years, he reckoned, he needs to be involved in game-building and combinations performed by his squad.

“I didn’t want to only wait for passes and crosses into the box,” he said, adding he is now benefitting from synergy effects after improving his goal record when it comes to long-distance shots and free-kicks.

The better his team is performing, the more chances he gets to score. To get to this conclusion, it takes experience, he added.

Having broken the 50-year-old record of German striker icon Gerd Mueller (40 goals in 1971-72) is paramount due to the long time it needed to set a new mark.

To break the record and outpace other top strikers in European leagues such as Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi “is special because we have four games less than the leagues in England, Spain, Italy or France.”

Lewandowski scored his 41 goals in only 29 games as he missed five due to an injury.

In total, the Pole scored 210 goals in 224 national league encounters. The 2020-21 season was the sixth in a row in which the forward passed the 20-goal mark in the German league.

In the current season, Lewandowski seems to go on with his goal-hunt already notching seven goals after five rounds of matches.

“When I went through a bad day, I told myself, it’s not only your legs, it’s your mind. I worked on that quite a while and trying to read the game better,” the Bayern forward said. Creating a solid mental state for him is as important as a good technique.

Lewandowski mentioned Dortmund’s Erling Haaland, Tottenham’s Harry Kane, Real Madrid’s Karim Benzema, and Chelsea’s Romelu Lukaku as part of the group of leading strikers.

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Xinhua