Who Is Kévin Danois – Meet Palace’s Latest Potential Signing
Crystal Palace have made an approach for Auxerre midfielder Kévin Danois, according to Fabrizio Romano. The 22-year-old has quietly developed into one of Ligue 1’s more interesting young midfielders, combining creativity, ball-carrying and a serious defensive workload. So, who is he, how does he play and where would he actually fit under Pierre Sage?
Crystal Palace have returned for a player they have seemingly been following for a few years now. Fabrizio Romano reports that Palace have made an approach for Auxerre midfielder Kévin Danois, with discussions understood to centre around a possible package worth approximately £25 million plus add-ons.
Palace were already named among Danois’ admirers during the January window, alongside Newcastle United, after the midfielder established himself as one of Auxerre’s most important players.
Danois offers a really useful mixture of technical security, creativity, running power and defensive involvement. He looks like a Pierre Sage midfielder.
WHO IS KÉVIN DANOIS?
Danois was born in Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, in June 2004.
He spent his early years with La Gauloise before moving to Auxerre’s academy in 2019, before making his senior debut in 2022.
In 2024/25 he made 22 Ligue 1 appearances and became one of the revelations of an Auxerre side that comfortably survived following promotion. L’Équipe described him as one of the club’s major breakthroughs, while manager Christophe Pélissier repeatedly praised his development.
By 2025/26, he was integral for the French side. Danois started 32 of Auxerre’s 33 league matches in which he appeared, accumulating 2,835 minutes during a difficult campaign which ended with the club securing survival on the final day.
He scored three times, registered one assist and averaged a 7.19 FotMob rating. He has also now captained Auxerre during pre-season despite only turning 22 in June.
There is some personality here alongside his footballing ability.
One potential hiccup is that Danois is contracted until June 2029 after extending his deal last October, Auxerre rate the player very highly and with transfer windows nearing a close, whose to know whether they will let the French talent depart.
WHAT TYPE OF MIDFIELDER IS DANOIS?
The easiest description is a modern box-to-box midfielder. He wants to be involved everywhere. He likes to drop deep to receive from defenders before either carrying the ball up through midfield or progressing possession via passing, he’s quite an exciting player in that sense and has the technical capacity given he started his career as a left-winger & attacking midfielder. He’s not just technical though, he’s also quite a physical player who will give his all to win the ball back – two qualities heavily admired by Sage, I would assume.
Former Ligue 1 goalkeeper Rémy Vercoutre described him as the “archetype of the modern midfielder”, highlighting his defensive discipline, ball-winning work, ability to play quickly with one touch and capacity to break lines.
L’Équipe’s reporting has repeatedly described him as a box-to-box midfielder, while Scouted Football’s data work placed Danois among the few young players across Europe’s major leagues whose touches were genuinely pretty evenly distributed across every third of the pitch.
PLAYMAKING ABILITIES
Danois appears to be a very capable chance creator. Despite finishing last season with only one Ligue 1 assist:
He created:
- 52 chances
- 10 big chances
- 4.65 expected assists
- 44 accurate crosses
- 90 accurate long passes
- 35 successful dribbles
FotMob ranks his chance creation in the 88th percentile among midfielders.
And that creativity does not come from Danois standing permanently around the opposition box, he can and does often create from deeper areas.
He is a comfortable set piece taker, happy on either flank and happy to dictate tempo or change his approach to advancing posession. He often plays ambitious diagonals and progressive forward passes, with a 68.2% long-ball completion rate.
He sees forward chances, and he is willing to make the ambitious passes that we typically see Wharton attempt.
BALL-CARRYING
Danois is also comfortable simply carrying the ball past pressure.
He completed 35 dribbles last season at a success rate of 58.3 per cent. Gradient’s data grades him particularly highly for both dribbling and ball carrying, ranking his crossing third among the midfielders in its Ligue 1 dataset and his dribbling fourth.
His dribbling isn’t explosive, but it is effective: beat the man and push forward as far as he can.
NOT AFRAID TO GET HIS FEET DIRTY
This may be the biggest reason Palace like him.
Last season Danois recorded:
- 78 tackles
- 38 interceptions
- 186 recoveries
- 17 possessions won in the final third
That is serious defensive volume for a midfielder also producing 52 chances. Datasets place him above roughly 80% of Ligue 1 midfielders for tackles and comfortably above average for interceptions.
He wants to press and he is comfortable stepping forward to challenge rather than simply protecting his position – again, very Sage-like.
There is a flaw here, though Danois was dribbled past 44 times and won only 47.2 per cent of his total duels last season.
His aerial numbers are also weak, winning 34.9 per cent.
So despite the defensive volume, I would not describe him as a defensive monster or a ‘destroyer’ – but he’s young and has demonstrated the physical willingness as well as the technical ability that Sage likes.
OURCPFC VERDICT: 8/10
