Scouting Borussia Dortmund Transfer Target Ousmane Dembele

With only one important game left in Borussia Dortmund's season—the DFB-Pokal final against Bayern Munich on May 21—many have started to focus on the summer transfer window.

The Black and Yellows, it seems, will lose a player or two, with Ilkay Gundogan close to joining Manchester City, per the Sun's Charlie Wyett, and captain Mats Hummels contemplating his future amid Bayern links, per German tabloid Bild (h/t ESPN FC's Stephan Uersfeld).

Dortmund will need reinforcements for next season as they return to Europe's biggest stage, the UEFA Champions League, and hope to fight for trophies in all competitions. One such reinforcement could be Stade Rennes attacker Ousmane Dembele.

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Magazine Sport Bild were the first outlet to report the link between 18-year-old Dembele and Dortmund, and those reports have since been confirmed by Matthias Dersch of Dortmund-based paper Ruhr Nachrichten, who claims that club and player have agreed to a deal in principle, with the clubs having to agree on a transfer fee (links in German).

Locking up Dembele would be quite the coup for the Black and Yellows, seeing as he was linked with many European giants. "Arsenal, Chelsea, City and Tottenham are among his suitors in the Premier League," wrote the Guardian's Ed Aarons in March, for instance.

One quick glance at Dembele's statistics of his first season in the French top flight are enough to understand what all the fuss is about. Having only debuted in November, the France under-21 international has already scored 12 goals for Rennes, which, per Aarons, made him the youngest player in the history of Ligue 1 to reach double figures.

The graphic from Football Radars below shows what an impressive all-around season Dembele is producing:

Dembele's numbers, which include five assists, per Transfermarkt.co.uk, are all the more impressive considering he's not an out-and-out striker. Rather, he's a quick winger who likes to drift into the middle to fire away shots. Per FourFourTwo's Andrew Gibney, Dembele has called Brazilian superstar Neymar a role model, and there's an element of that to his game.

Much like the Barcelona man, Dembele can feature all over the attacking line. Per Transfermarkt, he's played 11 matches on the right wing, nine on the left and five in a more central role. His two-footedness allows him to be a threat from any angle, while "his close control at high speed is both impressive and mesmerising, with the ball rarely deviating from his toes," as Gibney noted.

His "technique is what stands out the most," wrote tactics blogger Constantin Eckner in a scouting profile for Spielverlagerung.com. The video below shows some of his skills:

He looks like a very good fit for Dortmund, where head coach Thomas Tuchel places a premium on quickness in his attackers. Adding a versatile, young player to the squad is never a bad idea, and Dembele looks like a proper talent.

Former Manchester United and Arsenal defender Mikael Silvestre compared Dembele to a young Cristiano Ronaldo in an interview with France Football in January, per Gibney, telling the paper: "I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that he can win the Ballon d'Or."

Of course, there's a long way to go for that, and he'd need to work on a few weaknesses under Tuchel. Eckner pointed out that his "positional awareness and especially his understanding of tactical processes are nowhere near the level of his technical abilities," adding that "he thrives in fast-paced environments and struggles in tactically complicated settings."

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Only turning 19 in May, Dembele has all the time in the world to develop into a more well-rounded player. At Dortmund, he wouldn't need to become a regular starter quickly. Rather, he could be used in spots and as a devastating counter-attacking option from the bench while working hard at his deficiencies on the training ground.

Dembele has all the tools to become a massive success should Dortmund indeed be able to capture his signature in the coming weeks or months.

Lars Pollmann is a Featured Columnist writing on Borussia Dortmund. He also writes for YellowWallPod.com. You can follow him on Twitter.