Jump to content
IGNORED

Premier League Combined Goals & Assists Table 2011-12 MD 38

THFC6061
 Share

Recommended Posts

Guest Nikica

Guest Nikica

Posted
Posted (edited)

Thanks for posting this, it's an interesting list. Quite telling to see Rooney with so few assists - I was aware of this due to the fantasy football stats, but he's a more creative player than his stats would suggest. I think the fact that he's been the focal point of their attack this season and that there aren't many other good finishers in the team (other than Hernandez, who hasn't played often) has meant that he has less assists. I am sure he's created a fair amount of chances which have been wasted. Other than that the names are quite consistent with the most creative and productive players in the league.

 

Picking another player out, Nani, it's interesting to see that even though he's been in far inferior form to last season, he has still popped up with goals and assists. I personally rate him above Valencia, as far as I know United fans are split on the matter.

 

I think Juan Mata has been great this season. In a year when Chelsea have struggled, he's really provided many assists. Equally, Alex Song has impressive assist numbers given that he plays in the 2 in a 4231.

 

Despite the above, for me assists are quite an arbitrary statistic - quite often the best work for a goal is done before the assist eg player A beats 3 players or plays a fantastic one-two with another player, then plays it to player B who plays a simple 5 yard square ball for player C to score. In this example player B is credited with the assist, but player A or other players in the team did most of the real build up work in opening up the team. Other times the assist is fair as it comes from an exquisite through ball or fantastic cross. I suppose you could say goals are a bit like that as well as one player can do brilliant work in setting up another for a tap in. Essentially, my point is that quantitative data is useful, but certainly does not tell the full story and it's better to analyse games with your own eyes from a qualitative perspective.

 

There's also the issue of players not scoring 'consistently' i.e. they go through a streak of 10 goals in 10 games, then don't score another for 6 etc. Streaky players. Rooney has suffered this in some seasons and even RVP this season went 7 goals without scoring (other than a penalty) towards the season's climax. There's also the problem of players who rack up lots of essentially meaningless goals (other than for GD) in games which are won (Berbatov v Blackburn last season), versus players who might score less but score the winner more often. I suppose then we can get into a debate about how more goals deflates opposition etc so the goals might not be meaningless.

 

I still refer to goal and assist stats as productivity is highly important, but many of the players who have a big part in making teams tick (Busquets, Alonso, Xavi in the seasons when he has fewer assists, Carrick, your own Fellaini who is not on the list) are not represented properly by these stats. I suppose the most pertinent stats for those players are pass completion.

 

Anyway, the table is certainly interesting - I just thought this was a relevant thread for me to express my opinions on how stats can be misleading smile.png

Edited by Nikica
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...