FC Schalke: Who steps up when Amine Harit falters?
By Josh Sippie
FC Schalke have a lot to talk about these days, and Amine Harit is at the center of most of it. So let me ask the question: What happens when Harit stumbles?
Fresh off a disappointing loss to Bayer Leverkusen that FC Schalke have to feel they deserved more out of, reports are flying in that Amine Harit has extended his stay through 2024, upping his current deal that expired in 2021.
Needless to say, this is a massive bit of news, as Harit is such a central figure to the success of this team. And that, essentially, is what I’m here to talk about. Well, that and Bayer Leverkusen, and where the two intersect.
Amine Harit didn’t have his best match against Leverkusen. While he did make a few inquisitive passes late on, overall it was a match forget for him, and in the wake of that disappointment, the club fell.
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I’m not going to say it was all Harit’s fault that we lost, but it’s not a coincidence that in a match where he struggled, Schalke struggled as well.
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Amine Harit has been the centerpiece of this attack for a couple years now. It’s been feast or famine depending on how well he plays. We saw that last year, with it being almost exclusively famine and the club struggling to avoid relegation in response.
There are weapons around Harit, sure. Benito Raman has been a blessing and you can’t count out Suat Serdar, always lurking, ready to spring.
But the point remains that when Harit struggles to create, so too do Schalke. And that will continue to be a problem until someone else can fill that role and do something with it. For awhile there, I though the addition of Raman would lighten the load, and to be fair, it did. There was confidence in the attack aside from just what Harit could do.
That said, it is still a work in progress.
Serdar looks to be the most capable of stepping into the void when it develops, the problem there is that Serdar is even more inconsistent than Harit. You never know what he’s going to do, for better or worse.
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There are a lot of great pieces in place with this attack. Which is why I hate seeing it so easily derailed by the struggles of one man. It’s time to address this question now that Harit is staying around, and not to sound too confident, but count that as the one lingering piece that is holding the team back.