General Football Thread

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Analysis

Why are all the strikers massive again?

Detailing the reasons for and ramifications of the jumbo-sized centre-forward trend

https://scoutedftbl.com/why-all-the-strikers-massive-again/

 

The evolution of the 21st-century striker is documented, unsurprisingly, in books about tactics.

In The Mixer, Michael Cox writes that the old-school Premier League archetype of the centre-forward, “a tall, strong number-9 who remained in the penalty box and thrived on crosses”, eventually gave way to technical, hybrid strikers like Wayne Rooney, Carlos Tévez, Robin van Persie, Harry Kane, and even false nines like Roberto Firmino, who represented the antithesis to centre-forward orthodoxy.

Similarly, in Inverting the Pyramid, Jonathan Wilson describes how pure ”poachers” in the mould of Filippo Inzaghi and young Michael Owen were replaced by strikers who’d combine multiple traditional centre-forward archetypes in one. “The best modern forwards,” Wilson writes, “have at least an element of universality and – crucially – they have to be able to function within the system.” The age of the goal-hanging big striker was over; the time of the nine-and-a-half had come.

Today, the picture looks rather different. Most of the Premier League clubs challenging for titles and for Champions League qualification all possess, or are targeting, big, physical strikers. At the time of writing, Manchester City have Erling Haaland; Arsenal have bagged Viktor Gyökeres; Hugo Ekitiké is in Liverpool, signing a contract; Newcastle United are just about holding onto Alexander Isak; Liam Delap is settling in at Chelsea. What’s more, almost all the hyped young striker talents on the market are physical unicorns. Benjamin Šeško, Nick Woltemade, Samu Aghehowa, Emanuel Emegha, Tolu Arokodare, and Promise David are all 6’4” and above, and combine their height and strength with great mobility, if not blistering pace.

Most of these strikers aren’t known for their technical refinement in possession, either. Though their passing and link up play remains raw at best, buying clubs seem unperturbed. While it won’t much bother David Moyes, Everton’s new 6’5” signing Thierno Barry is a prime example: he possesses great physicality, off-ball intelligence, and dribbling, but completed just 8.1 passes p90 last season, and his first touch and weight of pass remain very inconsistent.

So what’s going on here? Why are big, physical strikers who spend most of their time stretching backlines and attacking the box en vogue again, decades after they were phased out?

The answer may lie in tactical trends over the past five years and emerging patterns in player development. Using stats, stills, and conversations with a few experts, I set out to investigate.d out more

The new centre-forward ‘meta’

As Jake discussed in his introduction to the Power Forward archetype, the game’s physicality has grown over the past six years. With every passing season, the fastest players get faster, while all players are tasked with more ‘High-Intensity Actions’. As a result, Jake notes, big clubs target physical profiles to fill the No.9 spot.

Tiago Estêvão, currently Famalicão’s Head of Recruitment and Performance Analysis and formerly a Technical Scout at AC Milan, believes this is a case of tactical environments and player skillsets shaping each other. “It’s a self-fulfilling system,” Tiago told me, “where with the ‘athletification’ of football, even at top-level, elite teams, you have big teams prioritising physical characteristics for their No.9s. You want tall, fast guys in the Haaland/Šeško mould of fast and tall, strong freaks.” He cites Manchester City’s signing of Haaland as the key turning point for this change in striker profiles at big clubs.

Others working in recruitment at the top level echo this opinion. “If you look at the Premier League,” a scout at a Premier League club, who wished to stay anonymous, told me, “it's pretty remarkable how homogeneous body types are across the pitch now. We've figured out that actually football does have a real physical ideal across positions in general, but strikers are your most important player so you in a way need them to be ‘perfect’ if you want to be competitive”.

Fans of basketball may notice a familiar pattern. When the pace-and-space era of the NBA and the rise of the three-pointer pushed traditional ‘bigs’ to the periphery, new generations of ‘bigs’ who developed their three-point-shooting, ball-handling, and passing skills emerged. Now, ‘small-ball’ experiments are outnumbered by double-big lineups in the playoffs. It’s intuitive to guess that the striker position in football is going through something similar. What’s better than a 5’9” striker who can link up play and facilitate final-third passing? A 6’3” striker who can link up play and facilitate final-third passing.

But here’s where the story gets more interesting: strikers aren’t just bigger in 2025, they also play the game rather differently.  For starters, strikers in the Big Five Leagues complete fewer passes now than at the beginning of the decade.

Plus, shots and touches in the box represent a larger proportion of strikers’ overall involvements today, with their ‘Shot Happiness’ and ‘Penalty-Area Proximity’ – to pilfer ideas from Jake –  increasing as the 2020s have progressed.

These trends aren’t limited to younger physical strikers, or among strikers leading the line at smaller clubs, either. When you look at the season-by-season passing numbers of established strikers at top clubs who’ve often been used as lone strikers, the vast majority of them complete fewer passes every year. The exceptions here are Alexander Isak, whose teams scaling in quality and style have increased his volume, and Harry Kane, whose numbers went up last season after years of decline. Nevertheless, the pattern is clear: every year, strikers at big clubs become less involved in link-up play.

Does this represent a return of the old-school striker that Cox referred to: big, strong strikers who stay in the box? Let’s dig into the tactical context.

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Man-marking, match-ups, and pinning

Surely the return of tall, physical strikers with great box presence has signalled the resurgence of crosses and long balls, of pumping it at the big guy’s head? Well, no, not really. Over the past five seasons, teams’ ratios of crosses to total passes in the Big Five Leagues have wavered slightly, with a small downward trend, while their ratios of long balls to total passes have fallen to a small extent. But as we’ll discuss later, teams are certainly playing more direct, just not through the air.

Plus, less of the game takes place in the air now, in general. In the 2020-21 season, the average Big Five League side contested 31.32 aerial duels per game; in 2024-25, they contested 27.15.

The answers lie in what teams do out of possession. I spoke with The Athletic’s Jon Mackenzie on this. “One of the biggest tactical evolutions of the last half-decades,” Jon says, “has come out of possession. Where man-marking had all but died out by around the early 2010s, we saw a resurgence of man-to-man ideas as the decade wore on because teams out-of-possession were increasingly less happy to allow the opposition to possess the ball without pressure.”

This in turn informs how teams attempt to pry open defences. “As this man-orientation became more prevalent,” he continues, “possession teams were incentivised to progress the ball through different means than simply short passing, one of which was playing direct. Because teams were pressing high and leaving their defenders one-on-one against forwards, bringing in strikers who could compete in duels had obvious upsides. So through time, we started seeing striker profiles evolving in that direction.”

Twitter’s resident striker expert, @sthsthburner, known as just ‘Seth’ or ‘Burner’, also notes the influence of out-of-possession trends. “An increase in man-to-man marking,” Burner says, “means hoofing it to a strong outlet or a channel runner is often the easiest or the best route, better still if they're a one-on-one or carrying threat to boot.”

Clearly, the proliferation of man-marking intuitively leads to strikers’ involvements in a game revolving around matchups and one-on-ones. However, interestingly enough, the numbers suggest that strikers don’t contest more one-on-one ‘duels’ on the ball. Strikers contest fewer aerial duels every passing season, while their one-on-one dribbling numbers fell noticeably hard last season. Teams aren’t pumping it to the big man up top more, or letting the striker ‘cook’ against centre-backs off the dribble.

Look at Robert Lewandowski’s positioning here when Bayern Munich aggressively press Barcelona’s build-up man-to-man.

Playing on the shoulder of the last defender, even slightly offside, Lewandowski pins back Bayern’s backline, creating either an option in behind if Barça decide to go direct, or space between Bayern’s midfield and backline if Barça attempt to play through the press. He’ll occasionally drop back and drag a defender with him when playing a one-touch layoff pass or heading the ball into space…

…but positioning himself on the last line very much remains the default, and Barça’s midfielders and wingers receive between the lines more, rather than their striker.

Haaland, who completed just 8.4 passes p90 last season, represents an extreme in how physically-gifted strikers are tasked with stretching backlines and occupying defenders to help their teams score, even in a high-possession system. In addition to positioning himself on the last line, he consistently sticks to the far-side of the play and vacates space, occupying defenders due to his physical and goalscoring threat. He doesn’t offer himself as an option, but still facilitates passing play around him.

Clearly, pinning back defenders becomes increasingly important in a new tactical environment, and people within the game recognise it, too. “The key for us with [our striker],” the anonymous Premier League scout says, “is his ability to be an outlet for us and his ability and willingness to make the runs that stretch the backline. His ability to drop in and play is respectable enough that you have to track him, but that makes that spin and run more potent.”

Recent trends in possession may also emphasise the value of pinning backlines and creating space. As Burner notes, the resurgence of prolific No.10s and touchline wingers necessitates strikers pinning backlines, creating targets for through-balls, and creating space for cut-backs. A mix of man-marking, the return of creative No.10s and touchline wingers, and the rise of goalscoring No.10s, he says, means there’s “more value in an outlet up top pinning the backline for them to arrive late to the box or even creating central spaces for cutbacks and hitting those cutbacks themselves.” In the age of front fives in possession and big, rich sides stacking attacking quality together, the guys up top prosper with more specific roles.

In this tactical environment, physical profiles are also especially well-suited to turning possession into goals. When a striker like Haaland attacks from the far-side of the ball, matchups become all the more crucial. With opponents setting up tight, compact blocks when the ball reaches the defensive third, teams tend to attack around defences rather than through them, as Liam Tharme noted for The Athletic - they progress the ball with diagonal passes out wide and then back inside to create shots. A striker on the wrong side of the defender manoeuvring his way towards the ball has to make the best use of his physical prowess and/or his off-ball guile. Haaland’s goal against Arsenal in City’s 1-5 loss provides an example: he outmuscles and outjumps William Saliba, which is no small feat.

This is Billy Carpenter’s ‘Ethan Pinnock test’. When a new generation of physically, mentally, and technically-gifted centre-backs form the spine of low-blocks and mid-blocks, “physical battles become paramount”. Strikers are tasked with creating mismatches, with strength, jumping, speed, and off-ball tricks, en route to attacking the back post.

Plus, the growing prominence of transitions is playing a key role, too. This season, in comparison to 2020-21, teams get on the ball slightly less in the middle third and progress up the pitch more quickly, especially in the attacking third. These differences may not be large but they represent the acceleration of a trend that’s been underway since the mid-2010s.

Naturally, a side hitting the opposition on the counter-attack requires a fast or aerially-dominant outlet to pump the ball to. “You can be a more traditional target man who the ball sticks to or more one who stretches the play,” the anonymous scout says, “but ultimately if you are looking to be breaking in transition, you can't be coming too deep and looking to get involved. Physicality helps here because I want my striker affecting the back line with his physical skills, making things difficult for them.”

Lastly, as Tiago noted in our conversation, two other early-2010s trends continue to shape the physicality of centre-forward profiles: pressing demands, and the increasing reliance on set-pieces to create shots. Strikers win the ball themselves less often now than at the beginning of the decade – doing so 0.96 times p90 on average, a slight decrease from 1.1 in 2020-21 – due to many high presses retreating into midfield blocks, but strikers are still tasked with intense off-ball work to usher opposition build-ups out wide.

Tactical systems on the pitch reveal one side of the story. What happens in academies and coaching set-ups, unbeknownst to outsiders, adds further nuance.

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Specialists and player development

Take a look through the names of all the hyped-up young strikers linked with big moves this summer, then look up their height. You'll find most, if not all, are 6'1" or above. Meanwhile, slightly undersized strikers - even the 5'10" Loïs Openda - rarely find their way to the headlines.

The anonymous scout notes that improvements in player development are allowing young, physically gifted strikers level-up their technical skillsets - meaning technicality is no longer the domain of the diminutive. “Essentially I think it's because we are just getting better at developing well-rounded footballers,” he says. “In the past players who were both technically gifted and physically gifted were unicorns. I think we've just begun to understand how to develop more of them”. He also adds that smaller, technical strikers are moved “to the periphery”.

Meanwhile, Tiago asserts that emerging striker profiles at the highest level are a result of tactical trends allowing unique physical profiles to progress further than they otherwise would - which then gives them a platform for technical improvement. “You have these guys who,” Tiago says, “years back, wouldn't ever reach a top team cause they'd only fit relegation football, reach a top team and do so early. And then presumably that increases your chances of technical development under elite coaches and conditions.” Many strikers nearing two metres tall may not turn into Harry Kane, but they can at the very least stop being liabilities with the ball. Šeško perhaps represents one such example.

Consequently, in a game previously defined by the increasing prominence of ‘generalists’, specialist strikers who thrive because of their divinely-ordained physical skillsets get a major head start. “Basketball used to have the concept of a ‘tweener’,” the unnamed scout says, “someone who wasn't a 4 or a 5, and it was a real negative term and that's how I feel about centre-forwards. If you’re a striker who doesn't always perform as a nine and we see you do alright out wide and no one is super sure what you are, then in my mind you are 100% a winger.”

Many of us have broad ideas about the history of football tactics. Some consider it a linear story of ‘development’ - from archaic kick-and-rush football to sophisticated press-and-possess tactics. Others think tactics move in circles; the 2-3-5 formation becomes dominant, is slowly replaced by formations with more defenders like the 5-3-2, which in turn is supplanted by top sides forming the 2-3-5 shape in possession. The famed pyramid is inverted and then re-inverted to fit new contexts. It’s easy to consider these top-level striker trends as similar.

But, crucially, the current dominant profile is inextricably linked to the tactical undercurrents that created the conditions for it, and must be viewed in its own terms. Even if strikers like Haaland and Barry don’t pass the ball much, their participation in their teams’ possession sequences, creating space for their teammates with carefully-considered positioning and physical engagement, is fundamental. Even if these strikers don’t create shots for themselves at the end of every possession, they certainly help their teammates pry open defences, in transition or against a settled block. To return to Wilson’s description of ‘the best modern forwards’, the new crop of strikers may not show the same ‘universality’, but certainly ‘function within the system’.

Although big strikers are the dominant force, it’s not all over for the little guy. They continue to flourish in front twos alongside a bigger striker, with Lautaro Martinez and Julian Alvarez key examples. Additionally, as Jon observed, big sides this pre-season and in the Club World Cup are experimenting with situational front-twos, thus pinning and occupying backlines in new ways.

Every tactical trend has a counter. As the pyramid slowly re-inverts, positional requirements will change with it, and the undersized striker might just become an undervalued commodity again soon. As someone who’s 5’7” on a good day, I know which profile I’m rooting for.

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Nominative determinism in football

Arsenal Wenger, James Trafford and the players and managers destined for clubs… because of their names

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6524643/2025/08/04/football-names-clubs-managers-arsenal-wenger/

 

Nominative determinism, i.e. the theory that people gravitate towards jobs or activities that reflect their name, is a thing.

Researchers once found that people called Dennis or Denise were more likely to gravitate towards dentistry (this is genuine).

It’s not a universal truth. Someone called Louise Baker isn’t necessarily destined to wear chef whites for a living. Likewise, Tony Dull doesn’t have to become an accountant.

But when Wolves signed David Moller Wolfe last week and James Trafford decided to join Manchester City, they became the latest quirks in football’s history of throwing up ironically placed players.

Trafford will not only return to the city that houses the shopping mall the Trafford Centre or the Trafford Park area, but also, of course, Old Trafford, i.e. the home of City’s greatest rivals. It’s a bit like someone called James Park being in goal for Sunderland.

He becomes the second goalkeeper in Manchester whose surname shares the name with a park in the city. Heaton Park, which recently hosted about 300,000 people across five glorious Oasis homecoming gigs, was named after Manchester United goalkeeper Tom Heaton in honour of his contribution to the club since he signed in 2021 (three appearances and counting). This is not true; the Heaton Hall estate dates back centuries, but hopefully you believed that for a second.

 

Tom Heaton, not the inspiration for Heaton Park (Octavio Passos/Getty Images)

Of course, Manchester United do have a young player named after them — Kobbie Mainoo. Or at least, to those fans who use Man U as a pejorative when referring to the club.

The most shocking example of a rival’s home in a player’s surname, though, has to be the man we know as Barcelona legend Gerard Pique, or to give him his full name, Gerard Pique Bernabeu. The Bernabeu, of course, is the name of rivals Real Madrid’s home ground.

However, the Bernabeu name is certainly no source of shame for Pique; his grandfather Amador Bernabeu was formerly a vice-president at Barcelona. Still, it’s pretty ironic that one of Real Madrid’s ultimate hate figures shares a name with the club’s home.

Sometimes you see the name of a club and think it must be fate. That was certainly Arsenal vice-chairman David Dein’s take when, in 1989, he met some chap called Arsene Wenger for the first time.

Wenger, then Monaco manager, attended an Arsenal match at their old Highbury ground, and Dein took him to a friend’s house for dinner.

“I thought, ‘This guy’s something special, he’s a bit different’,” Dein later recalled to the BBC. “Just then it was like a flash of lightning, I sort of saw in the sky: ‘Arsene for Arsenal: it’s destiny; one day he will be our manager’.”

Three Premier League titles and seven FA Cups later, Dein’s destiny worked out alright. Good job that he wasn’t called Dave Wenger.

Perhaps the most blatant case of managerial nominative determinism is Wolfgang Wolf managing Wolfsburg.

It was only his second career job (after Stuttgarter Kickers), and he lifted Wolfsburg to what was then the club’s highest-ever finish of sixth in 1999, lasting five years before he was kicked out of the pack.

You might think Molineux was the next logical destination for Wolf, which sadly never happened. Wolves had already signed a namesake in 1994, though, in the form of Dutch defender John de Wolf. This wasn’t due to a flash of lightning that then Wolves manager Graham Taylor saw in the sky; Taylor had been impressed by De Wolf when seeing him play for the Netherlands against England.

“I wrote a book in 1994 and said hopefully one day I’d play in England… the book came out in December and that was the month I joined Wolves,” De Wolf later told The Athletic. “Also, the name of the club — my name! It just fitted.”

De Wolf was an instant cult hero. “De Wolf man” was a regular chant at Molineux when the burly defender with a lengthy golden mane would saunter up the field to take long throws.

He’s now been followed up by Wolves signing AZ Alkmaar’s Norwegian left-back David Moller Wolfe for €11.5m (£10m).

Wolfe told Wolves.co.uk: “Personally, I think it’s pretty cool to have that surname and then to play for Wolverhampton.

“Me and my brothers have actually joked a little bit about it a couple of years ago, and now it is turning into a reality. I think it was meant to be.”

There was only one club that recently retired midfield Salva Sevilla was supposed to play for, but sadly he only ever made the B team for the Spanish club. Surprisingly, he would go on to make his name at Sevilla’s big rivals Real Betis. Ditto former Tottenham Hotspur defender Mike England, who managed Wales for eight years in the 1980s.

Mat Sadler, though, did get it right when he played for Walsall, i.e. the Saddlers, not once but twice during his playing days, and is now the club’s manager.

 

Mat Sadler, the manager of the Saddlers (Morgan Harlow/Getty Images)

Graham Potter served ‘the Potters’ with distinction during his playing days when he featured for Stoke City for three years. Christian Fuchs joined the right English club when he moved to Leicester City in 2015; Fuchs in German means fox.

It’s not just club names that elicit destiny for players; positions do too.

What other position on the field would former Belgian player Mark De Man play other than defence? It just had to be true.

In fact, De Man played all across the back line, as a full-back or a centre-back and was even known to pop into defensive midfield, playing for Anderlecht in Belgium and with Roda JC in the Dutch Eredivisie, all the while shadowing his opponents extremely closely. Opposition players knew exactly who was arriving when their team-mates shouted; “De Man on!”

In a less obvious but still fitting outcome, one-time Premier League player John Utaka simply had to play as an attacker, which he did pretty successfully for Portsmouth in the late 2000s, providing the cross that led to Portsmouth’s winning goal in the 2008 FA Cup final.

Some names are curious given their styles of play, like beanpole 6ft 7in striker Peter Crouch, or legendary Italian defender Claudio Gentile, a player famed for being an aggressive nutcase rather than a serene ball-player.

Names don’t always forge a path of fate in football; Gareth Barry never played for Barry Town, while Isaac Success only played for Watford in England. But when it happens, it’s pretty satisfying.

[Vesper 31,180]

Men’s Ballon d’Or top 30

1. Ousmane Dembele (PSG & France)
2. Lamine Yamal (Barcelona & Spain)
3. Vitinha (PSG & Portugal)
4. Mohamed Salah (Liverpool & Egypt)
5. Raphinha (Barcelona & Brazil)
6. Achraf Hakimi (PSG & Monaco)
7. Kylian Mbappe (Real Madrid & France)
8. Cole Palmer (Chelsea & England)
9. Gianluigi Donnarumma (Manchester City & Italy)
10. Nuno Mendes (PSG & Portugal)
11. Pedri (Barcelona & Spain)
12. Khvicha Kvaratskhelia (PSG & Georgia)
13. Harry Kane (Bayern & England)
14. Desire Doue (PSG & France)
15. Viktor Gyokeres (Arsenal & Sweden)
16. Vinicius Junior (Real Madrid & Brazil)
17. Robert Lewandowski (Barcelona & Poland)
18. Scott McTominay (Napoli & Scotland)
19. Joao Neves (PSG & Portugal)
20. Lautaro Martinez (Inter & Argentina)
21. Serhou Guirassy (Borussia Dortmund & Guinea)
22. Alexis Mac Allister (Liverpool & Argentina)
23. Jude Bellingham (Real Madrid & England)
24. Fabian Ruiz (PSG & Spain)
25. Denzel Dumfries (Inter & Netherlands)
26. Erling Haaland (Man City & Norway)
27. Declan Rice (Arsenal & England)
28. Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool & Netherlands)
29. Florian Wirtz (Liverpool & Germany)
30. Michael Olise (Bayern & France)

Women’s Ballon d’Or top 30

1. Aitana Bonmati (Barcelona & Spain)
2. Mariona Caldentey (Arsenal & Spain)
3. Alessia Russo (Arsenal & England)
4. Alexia Putellas (Barcelona & Spain)
5. Chloe Kelly (Arsenal & England)
6. Patricia Guijarro (Barcelona & Spain)
7. Leah Williamson (Arsenal & England)
8. Ewa Pajor (Barcelona & Poland)
9. Lucy Bronze (Chelsea & England)
10. Hannah Hampton (Chelsea & England)
11. Claudia Pina (Barcelona & Spain)
12. Marta (Orlando Pride & Brazil)
13. Caroline Graham Hansen (Barcelona & Norway)
14. Barbra Banda (Orlando Pride & Zambia)
15. Sandy Baltimore (Chelsea & France)
16. Cristiana Girelli (Juventus & Italy)
17. Temwa Chawinga (Kansas City Current & Malawi)
18. Melchie Dumornay (OL Lyonnes & Haiti)
19. Klara Buhl (Bayern & Germany)
20. Pernille Harder (Bayern & Denmark)
21. Amanda Gutierres (Palmeiras & Brazil)
22. Esther Gonzalez (Gotham FC & Spain)
23. Johanna Rytting Kaneryd (Chelsea & Sweden)
24. Sofia Cantore (Washington Spirit & Italy)
25. Emily Fox (Arsenal & USWNT)
26. Lindsey Heaps (OL Lyonnes & USWNT)
27 (tied). Frida Maanum (Arsenal & Norway)
27 (tied). Clara Mateo (Paris FC & England)
29. Steph Catley (Arsenal & Australia)
30. Caroline Weir (Real Madrid & Scotland)

[Special Juan 28,869]

Absolute farce

[Vesper 31,180]

Mbappé v Haaland v Kane

https://scoutedftbl.com/mbappe-haaland-kane-best-striker-in-the-world/

For the first time in Erling Haaland’s lifetime, Norway are going to the men’s World Cup.

The man who had not yet been born when Norway reached the knockout stages for the first time in 1998 will, in 2026, be leading the line for his country as the all-time top-scorer. After back-to-back braces in a historic international break, Haaland has now scored 55 goals in 48 caps.

Of the 84 men with at least 50 goals at professional senior international level, only one has a better goals-per-game ratio than Haaland; Niels Poul Nielsen scored 52 goals in 38 caps for Denmark.

It would be very easy to argue, then, that Haaland will heading to the 2026 FIFA World Cup as the best goalscorer in the world. I have used ‘best goalscorer’ instead of ‘best striker’ intentionally. Not because I disagree, but because 'goalscorer' requires greater nuance. It sounds ridiculous to write, but not every striker should be evaluated on their goal output alone.

Kylian Mbappé and Harry Kane also scored a brace of their own during this break, taking their international tallies to 55 in 94 caps and 78 in 112 caps respectively. Combined, Mbappé, Kane and Haaland scored 8 goals and attempted 20 shots between them during this international break. Across league and UEFA Champions League competition this season, they have scored 55 goals in 45 games. They are the three most prolific goalscorers on the planet right now.

So, given how well the Rice v Caicedo discussion in the previous international break went down [we see you lot, only clicking when we wade into mainstream drama. Shame - ed] I’ve decided to do something similar. I am going to wander the same profiling path for these three players in attempt to translate their style as a striker into any particular metrics that we can then use to discover similar players. The not-so-groundbreaking theory is that despite all three players scoring a bucket-load of goals, the similarities might end there.

Conveniently, Kane (57), Mbappé (55) and Haaland (53) are the only three players that have scored 50 non-penalty goals across Europe’s Big Five Leagues since the start of the 2023/24 season. We'll be comparing that output within a pool of 283 players tagged exclusively as a Forward when exporting the data from Stathead FBRef, each with at least 900 minutes played in that period.

I am fully aware that no matter how well this newsletter appears to translate style, we’ll never be able to find players of similar substance.

The starting graph provides an immediate and interesting contrast just by looking at the total number of touches. Haaland barely touches the ball, Kane is operating at an average level and Mbappé is funnelled possession constantly.

Looking at specific zones, Mbappé is the most extreme of outliers for Touches in the Attacking Penalty Area per 90 while Haaland is the most extreme of outliers for Penalty Box Proximity (the percentage of touches inside the opposition box). Straight away we have an effectiveness versus efficiency contrast.

Of course, due to their standing as the most elite forwards in the world, they also rank well for the mirror metric. But it’s clear from the off that Mbappé is the most effective at getting touches inside the box, while Haaland is the most efficient. In fact, Mbappé is a super-effective final third presence overall, not just inside the box.

Haaland’s AOE is the penalty area, Mbappé’s is the final third. But what about Kane?

Well, he doesn’t profile notably above or below average for any substance or style metrics. As we saw with Declan Rice, the ability to operate at an average level across all thirds is a skill or at least a playing style in itself. It’s just incredibly hard to quantify or spot. And although he ranks above average for the penalty box metrics, he doesn’t camp inside it, unlike Haaland.

Perhaps the most striking datapoint for Kane when looking at AOE is Percentage of Passes Received as Progressive Passes. In direct comparison with Haaland and Mbappé specifically, he is very different. Let’s keep exploring.

The primary function of pretty much any striker is taking shots and all three of these players are well above average for Shots per 90. However, we once again see that Mbappé is super-effective - he ranks first for volume with 4.7 per 90 - and Haaland is hyper-efficient - he ranks first with 17.3% of his Touches as Shots. Kane is in the middle of these two for both metrics. The same points apply to Shot Involvements when including Key Passes: Mbappé is super-effective, Haaland is super-efficient, Kane is an elite balance of both. We don’t learn too much beyond what we already know through this graph.

When it comes to Production, all three players are shooters first, shot-assisters second - although Mbappé is again super-effective at producing both - so let’s take a closer look at Shooting as a skill.

Again, these three players are the elite so it shouldn’t be a surprise to see them rank well above average for most metrics. Instead, then, it’s worth focussing on the most extreme differences between them.

From top to bottom, the first row that might catch your eye is Non-Penalty Goals - Non-Penalty Expected Goals (NPG-NPxG). Essentially, Mbappé and Kané are performing significantly above the average centre-forward while Haaland is operating just above the expected level.

It’s quite obvious that this is linked to Average Shot Distance and Non-Penalty xG per Shot. To use either end of the spectrum again, Mbappé is shooting from 17.8 yards on average compared to Haaland’s 12.1 yards which means that when the Frenchman scores, he’s pretty much always over-performing. Conversely, because of Haaland’s ability to take shots from the most dangerous positions, he’s penalised quite heavily if he does miss one.

That’s why it’s so important to consider these efficiency metrics in conjunction with output. Mbappé and Haaland rank first and second for Shots On Target per 90. Mbappé is likely to hit the target due to the sheer volume of efforts - he’s effective. Haaland is likely to score because of the location of his efforts - he’s efficient. Kane, once again, falls in the middle of these two.

But now we’re going to take a look at what makes Harry Kane completely unique.

As we’ve seen with pretty much every stat so far, Mbappé is ultra-high usage while the extent of Haaland’s passing is a collection of short bounce passes.

But I adore Kane’s Passing profile. Relative to other strikers, Kane has absolutely no interest in those Short Passes (between 5 and 15 yards). He plays them, but the majority of his passes are either Medium (34.3) or Long Passes (15.2%). When it comes to Long Passes (>30 yards), Kane not only ranks above average for per 90, but he is a huge outlier for style.

This is why his Percentage of Passes Received was below average and I think it makes his goalscoring output even more impressive. This guy is quarter-backing while maintaining a scoring rate of 0.85 Non-Penalty Goals per 90.

Kane is also Switching play (0.6 P90) or playing a Through Ball (0.52 P90) once every 90 minutes. This outrageous and ambitious profile becomes even more obvious when looking at Progression and Penetration via Passing.

Strikers like Haaland should never be evaluated based on any of this metrics. He ranks below average for every metric and towards the very bottom for a few. But it has no bearing on his game, or at the very least his role for Manchester City.

Kane, however, is a phenom. His penchant for Long Passes means he ranks second in the entire dataset for Distance per Pass Completed and 7th for Progressive Distance per Pass Completed. He is spraying it the width and length of the pitch.

Similarly to the contrast between Mbappé and Haaland for Shooting, the same relationship emerges between Mbappé and Kane for Passing: Mbappé is super-effective, Kane is hyper-efficient. I’m not convinced 'efficiency' is the right word for every metric here - the average of length of a pass is very much a stylistic trait. However, it’s clear that when Kane decides to pass, it’s extremely likely that he’s going to achieve meaningful Progression or Penetration.

Combining these traits with his Shooting effectiveness and efficiency despite the below average Shot Distance helps illustrate that ball-striking ability and vision we know Kane has in abundance; he can effortlessly cover distance with one swing of his boot. The question remains whether it will prove valuable when looking for similar players or is it a purely unique trait?

But while Passing helped separate Kane from our other elite picks, Carrying begins to cast a spotlight on Mbappé.

In fact, the only Carrying metrics that Haaland and Kane rank above for are the Percentage of Carrying Distance as Progressive Distance (Direct Ratio) and the Percentage of Carries as Carries into the Penalty Area - although the later applies to Haaland only.

I think that metric does help highlight Haaland’s Power Forward playstyle. His data makeup is very much that of a Goal Hanger due to the dominance of Manchester City, but this season we are starting to see more of those bulldozing carries through the centre.

For Mbappé, however, his wide forward tendencies are blatantly obvious through the ultra-high usage once again. He averages 2.73 CPA per 90, just below Mohamed Salah and just above Rafael Leão while the top-ranking players for this metric are Vinícius Júniior (4.68), Noni Madueke (3.77) and Bradley Barcola (3.47).

However, if we take a closer look at the breakdown of Progression and Penetration, Mbappé is not an outlying carry-first forward.

Kane’s reliance on his Passing is obvious. He is notably above average for the Percentage of his Progressive Actions as Passes, Final Third Entries as Passes and Penalty Area Entries as Passes. We then see the long-range, heat-seeking style illustrated through his Z-Scores for Distance per Action and Progressive Distance per Action. My theory is that he will index even more into this superpower as he ages, something I briefly touched on in a recent edition of The Shortlist.

It turns out that Mbappé is not just super-effective at moving the ball into the final third or penetrating the penalty area, he’s pretty efficient. But he’s not particularly biased when it comes to Passing or Carrying to achieve it. I was quite surprised by that, especially considering how much he dribbles.

Just as Passing was Kane’s secondary superpower (or you could even argue his primary one given its uniqueness), Dribbling is certainly Mbappé’s. His volume is once again elite, but he is also above average for the stylistic metric, Percentage of Touches as Take-On Attempts. He also ranks in the top 10 for Shot-Creating Actions via Take-Ons: he uses Dribbling as a means to achieve Production.

His dribbling preference becomes even more extreme when looking towards the sky. Mbappé ranks joint-last alongside Lamine Yamal for the Percentage of Touches as Aerial Duels with just 0.47% - they have absolutely no interest, or rather no need, to challenge anything in the air.

Kane and Haaland meanwhile are competent in aerial contests but are not asked to engage in them as often as most centre-forwards, a luxury afforded by their team’s dominance. But a high-volume of Aerial Duels does not always reflect aerial ability, especially for strikers. For example, Haaland has attempted the most headed shots across Europe’s Big Five Leagues this season.

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So, to sum it all up, although Erling Haaland, Harry Kane and Kylian Mbappé are the most prolific goalscorers in the world right now, they have earned that reputation through different means.

👤

Kylian Mbappé is an ultra-high usage, super-effective, dribble-first phenom. Give him the ball in and around the final third and let him cook, as the kids say. He will produce a bucket-load of shots for himself and for his teammates through flashes of flair.

👤

Erling Haaland is a hyper-efficient shot-monster. We can’t quantify this with FBRef metrics, but his combination of stature, speed and intelligent movement grants him the unique ability to generate a tonne of shots from the most dangerous locations.

👤

Harry Kane is an unrelenting forward-first frontman. Whether lining up a max-range pass or striking the ball at goal, his ability to turn the ball into a heat-seeking missile means he can blow open a game at any given moment from any part of the pitch and is always looking to do so.

Understanding the master of a craft gives you the tools to discover an apprentice. But we’ll save that for the SCOUTED Squads, coming to an email inbox near you soon.

[NikkiCFC 8,529]

 

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3 hours ago, NikkiCFC said:

 

I HATE this!

[Blue Armour 4,759]

10 hours ago, NikkiCFC said:

 

This will effectively kill the offside trap.

There's a reason why the offside rule came into place. The new rule will encourage speed demons playing on the shoulder of the last defender.

Wenger probably thinks he is creating more goals, but this will only force teams to sit further back in their own half and defend to prevent attackers slipping by.

So much for front-foot football.

Edited December 31, 2025 by Blue Armour

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Cannabis, conveyer belts and Christmas trees: The magic of Real Madrid’s pitch

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6925721/2025/12/31/real-madrid-bernabeu-pitch-stadium-design/

This December, a Real Madrid-themed winter wonderland has taken over the Bernabeu.

The club are calling it Mavidad (navidad is Spanish for Christmas). A giant slide now stretches from the stands to the playing surface, where an ice rink, stalls and hot chocolate stands are where the pitch would be.

It is another example of how Madrid are looking to increase stadium-related revenue at their redesigned home ground.

Back in November, the NFL came to the Bernabeu. Artists such as Taylor Swift have held concerts there, although these have been suspended after legal action from nearby residents who complained about the noise.

Madrid’s idea is to boost their finances and help repay the costs of the iconic ground’s renovation. They have already invested €1.3bn (£1.1bn; $1.6bn) in the refurbishment — with around 87 per cent of that money borrowed.

In 2024-25, Madrid’s stadium revenues totalled €326million (£284m; $383m), an “enormous” figure according to The Athletic’s football finance expert Chris Weatherspoon, and one which the club still believes is well short of the Bernabeu’s potential. Events and concerts generated €15.4m — but none were allowed after September 2024.

If there is one secret to bringing Madrid’s plan all together, it is the remarkable technology hidden underneath the stadium.

Mavidad will shut later today. By Saturday, the Christmas trees will be gone and the pitch will have been brought back into place, emerging from below via a complex system of conveyor belts. On Sunday, Xabi Alonso’s side welcome Real Betis as La Liga resumes from its winter break.

How does it all work?

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Underneath Madrid’s ground lies a cavernous and intricate piece of engineering described as the world’s first by those involved in its design and construction.

Real Madrid insiders refer to it by a nickname: el hipogeo — the hypogeum — a term that typically describes elaborate subterranean burial places from the ancient world.

Madrid’s version runs about 25 metres deep underneath the Bernabeu, along the west side of the ground.

Jorge Vizcaya, an architect at SENER, the company that carried out the project, says it comes close to an underground railway line that “practically skirts the north-east corner of the stadium”. He adds: “It would only take a deviation of one centimetre to touch the train tunnel.”

The pitch is divided into six sections, 11.67m wide and 107m long. When they need to be replaced, a remarkable piece of engineering means they can essentially be neatly folded down into the depths. It allows Madrid to quickly and efficiently change their playing surface, or swap it out for an alternative.

The pitch replacement system was a key part of the Bernabeu redesignReal Madrid

Down there, more remarkable things happen. The ‘hypogeum’ is essentially an enormous greenhouse, although one entirely devoid of natural sunlight.

According to Madrid, sources familiar with the system — who, like others consulted for this article, preferred to speak anonymously as they did not have permission to comment — the height of the Bernabeu’s stands (about 60m) would make it difficult to fully rely on natural sunlight to help keep the grass of the pitch in perfect condition. Now it is treated with grow lamps, up on the surface and down below, where backup pitches are prepared for later use.

These same sources also explain that Madrid took inspiration from scientific studies on cannabis cultivation to help design their underground grow house, as they were among the few available on indoor grass cultivation.

Vinicius Junior running at Sevilla defender Juanlu Sanchez on December 20Alberto Gardin/NurPhoto via Getty Images

During its first season in operation, over 2023-24, there were issues with the Bernabeu pitch. It was common for the turf to be in less-than-perfect condition.

Now, the situation is considered to be more settled, although improvements continue to be made. Usually, the turf is replaced before the start of the season and, if necessary, again during the campaign. When Madrid hosted Sevilla on December 20, they did so with a newly installed turf.

The process of changing the turf usually takes around two days (three at most) and consists of removing the field, installing the new drainage system and laying the grass. Any turf that is stored below the pitch is monitored carefully to make sure that conditions are correct.

There is a team of approximately 70 people, including full-time and part-time staff, with responsibilities for maintaining and improving the various pitches at Real Madrid. In total, they have 13 natural turf pitches across the Bernabeu and the training ground.

Madrid also have a laboratory in their training complex, where experiments on improvements to the condition of the grass can be conducted, involving tests with different types of seeds, equipment and treatments.

Due to European and Spanish regulations, which are stricter than those in England or the U.S., the club follows environmentally friendly conservation methods. For example, fungi that are harmful to the grass are not killed with pesticides, but with ultraviolet light.

The condition of the grass is also carefully checked to ensure conditions are suitable to try and prevent injuries.

For some time, there has been speculation that the Bernabeu’s turf was painted. The rumours reached the club, where some employees even asked if this was the case, but according to knowledgeable sources, it is not true.

To build their huge underground greenhouse, Madrid requested a loan of €225million, to be repaid at an interest rate of 1.53 per cent, which the club considered advantageous. Sources at SENER say their system was not as expensive as the amount requested in that second loan, but added that costs reflected the nature of building around an existing structure.

go deeper on the story

The BookKeeper: Real Madrid, the world’s richest football club, analysed like never before

Real Madrid's remarkable financial power is dissected in compelling depth and detail in the latest edition of The BookKeeper

In total, Madrid arranged three loans totalling €1.17billion of debt for the Bernabeu refurbishment, with an average interest rate of 3.2 per cent.

The other two loans were for €575million (at an interest rate of 2.5 per cent), mainly for the stadium’s exterior structure and retractable roof, and €370m (at an undisclosed interest rate) to cover cost overruns.

At Madrid’s ordinary general meeting of members in November, the club president, Florentino Perez, said the investment made so far was €1.347 billion, but he did not specify whether that could increase due to further works, such as the soundproofing the stadium must now have.

But the big idea is that the boost in revenue Madrid hope to bring in through keeping the Bernabeu operational year-round will contribute to covering those costs — and over time further help the club’s financial picture.

By Guillermo Rai

Football Writer, Real Madrid

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Martin O'Neill is returning to Celtic as manager for the remainder of the season following the dismissal of Wilfried Nancy.

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FBref and Opta: The data break-up that sent soccer’s analytics world into meltdown

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7002196/2026/01/28/fbref-opta-football-data-soccer-analytics/

Anyone not plugged into football’s online discourse may have missed it, but the analytics community was rocked by a seismic event last week.

FBref.com, once the great Alexandrian library of free football data, has been stripped of its advanced metrics after announcing on January 20 that Stats Perform, the company behind Opta, had informed them it was terminating their data agreement.

Why did this happen? What does it mean for the availability of advanced football data, or for informed, independent football analysis? And can we enjoy expected goals anywhere else online?

Here is an attempt to explain…

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What is FBref?

Since its launch in June 2018, FBref has established itself as by some distance the most comprehensive and popular public football database on the world wide web, offering a huge array of basic and advanced data on men’s and women’s players, clubs, leagues and cup competitions from all over the world.

This resource presented metrics including expected goals, expected assists and advanced goalkeeper performance data in sortable tables to view or download.

Whether you were a fan simply attempting to settle a debate with friends, a Fantasy Premier League manager trying to decide on your weekly transfers, a journalist (like this one) looking to inform an article you were working on, or a football analytics enthusiast producing your own independent content, FBref was generally the first port of call.

That reputation was founded on the staggering breadth and impressive quality of the data that FBref offered. Earlier in the site’s history, this data came from StatsBomb, but for the past three years, it has been provided by Opta, part of Stats Perform.

Advanced football data is still available in several places onlineCarl Recine/Getty Images

What has the reaction been? Why has it been so vociferous?

Stats Perform’s sudden divorce from FBref was met with shock by many in the football analytics community, followed by an outpouring of anger from some. These emotions were fanned by the tone of the statement on FBref’s website announcing the news.

The statement, attributed to Sean Forman, president of FBref’s parent company, Sports Reference, said the significant gap in FBref’s stats created by Stats Perform’s decision had left Sports Reference “heartbroken” for their users and their staff.

“Data democratization is a core Sports Reference value and the removal of this data is a sad day for all of us,” Forman added.

Forman’s words resonated with regular users of FBref. “Awful, this,” football content creator Adam Clery posted on X. “Not an exaggeration to say that the entire independent football analysis scene is built on the back of @fbref giving *everyone* access to useful and interesting data. Killing it as a resource is such a sad indictment of where football’s heading.”

Many independent football analysts had come to depend on FBref, and some had even used the site’s data to build their own graphics and analytical models. It had been credited with helping to make advanced data accessible to a broader audience and thereby create smarter, more informed fans. In some cases, it has even helped to launch careers.

That process may continue, but FBref’s prominent role in it appears to be over.

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Why has the data been removed?

In a statement issued to The Athletic, Stats Perform said: “Stats Perform values its commercial relationships and takes its contractual obligations seriously. We also expect our customers to take their obligations seriously by using the data we provide according to the terms of the agreement.

“Sports Reference and its websites did not use the data received from Stats Perform according to the terms of the agreement, and after investigation, it became clear Stats Perform needed to terminate the agreement and remove Sports Reference’s access to our data.

“While it is regrettable that we ended up having to do this, Stats Perform did not simply terminate a customer agreement without a valid basis to do so, and any information saying otherwise is incorrect.”

Neither of the principal parties is prepared to publicly detail the nature of the alleged infringement. In a statement issued to The Athletic, Forman said: “Stats Perform’s demand that we remove the statistics came unexpectedly, despite our long-standing, good-faith operation of FBref and Stathead.

“We have operated our sites in a consistent manner since FBref launched, and we have always welcomed open and frank discussions with our partners about how our sites operate.

“We’re disappointed for our users to lose access to this data, particularly in areas like women’s soccer, where high-quality public data remains limited.”

Data-led storylines are a familiar part of modern footballMichael Regan/Getty Images

Does it have anything to do with gambling companies? How about FIFA?

More conspiratorially minded observers quickly pointed out that FBref’s statement announcing the loss of their advanced data came just eight days after FIFA publicised that they had chosen Stats Perform as their first official betting data and betting streaming rights distributor, granting the company “exclusive rights to distribute official betting data and live streams for selected FIFA properties”, including every match at this summer’s World Cup.

The central claim of the conspiracy theory, pushed by some social media users and online content creators, was that FIFA pushed Stats Perform to end free public access to its advanced data via FBref as a condition of the deal. There is no evidence that this is the case.

FIFA declined to comment when contacted by The Athletic, though one official, speaking anonymously, dismissed the notion of any link between the two decisions. Stats Perform said: “The termination of the agreement with Sports Reference has nothing to do with our recently announced FIFA rights agreement. The FIFA partnership is for official betting rights, whereas Sports Reference was a media/editorial customer. The two are not related.

“Stats Perform has many ongoing, valuable deals in the media, tech, and fan engagement sectors. This industry sector remains an important part of our strategy, and is one we continue to invest in. We are committed to offering the highest level of service and highest quality products to all clients.”

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What will FBref do going forward?

In his statement announcing the termination of the Stats Perform agreement, Forman said: “We will take time to assess possible paths forward. FBref will continue to present the deep historic basic data we have for over 100 competitions, but if we present advanced data in the future, it will certainly have a dramatically smaller scale.”

There is the possibility that Sports Reference could partner with another football data provider, but finding one that operates on the scale of Opta is highly unlikely.

For now, FBref persists as a large repository of basic rather than advanced football data, its utility not entirely destroyed but greatly diminished.

Another thorny issue for Sports Reference to address is the future of Stathead. Launched in 2023, it is a subscription research tool which enabled users to search the FBref database for statistics related to individual players, teams, seasons and matches.

In the wake of Stats Perform’s decision to terminate the data agreement, FBref confirmed it would contact Stathead subscribers to offer refund options.

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Do any other websites show the same information?

There may not be one single public football database as comprehensive as FBref was, but there are plenty of other places to find advanced data that are free to use.

The first, and perhaps the best, is Opta’s own public data hub, The Analyst, which features an impressive array of player and team metrics for English and European competitions, as well as Opta’s league prediction model. Then there is WhoScored, which is also supplied by Opta and has advanced player and team data for a wide range of club and international competitions, as do the likes of Sofascore and Fotmob.

Other well-regarded independent football data websites include Transfermarkt and Understat, plus, of course, The Athletic’s own data journalism.

All is not lost, expected goal junkies.

By Liam Twomey

Chelsea Correspondent

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Like burning the library of Alexandria

 

One user compared it to burning the library of Alexandria. If anything, it was more dramatic. That Alexandria lost its library in one act of pyromania is a myth (its decline was more gradual) but the way FBref, football’s most detailed public data repository, withdrew its most granular data overnight was genuinely legendary. One day it was there. The next it was gone, without a trace of what had existed before beyond the memories of neatly organised statistical tables, in the minds of statistically-obsessed football fans. For those unfamiliar with FBref, it was the first point of call for any football fan who wanted to understand the game a bit deeper.  Its statistics – which included detailed breakdowns of players, teams, Europe’s top five leagues, Uefa competitions and international tournaments – included things such as: expected goals, expected assists, shots, touches, defensive actions, carries and shot-creating actions. However, on January 20, FBref announced that it had taken down all of its “advanced data”, after their data provider, Opta, issued a letter terminating their access to data feeds, “and requiring the deletion of their data from the site immediately.” FBref duly complied, leaving the website with just the most proprietary information remaining: goals, assists, saves. It was a move that shocked the football analytics community, and sent it into mourning.  Over the years, casual fans, fantasy football players, analysts, content creators, and journalists like myself, used the data on FBref to inform analysis. For example, following conversations with people involved with recruiting and analysing data at one of the Premier League’s biggest clubs, I used the data on the website to produce this graphic, to see how Bruno Fernandes’s shooting rate influenced that of his team-mates.  It was merely an (incomplete) idea, but it was interesting enough for me, during a week off work, to grab my laptop and check to see if there was anything striking without needing to calculate whether there was an inverse relationship between Fernandes’s shot rate and that of his team-mates. In the end, the chart wasn’t published, but this serves as an example of how any curious person could quickly check out a simple idea and then try to share that finding with others. Until FBref provided data on its website, it was generally quite difficult to find good, reliable data on competitions like the Premier League (if you weren’t a media organisation with a contract with a data provider). There were some websites: Understat is a popular one (which seems unlikely to get taken down anytime soon given it is based in Russia), but their expected goals model isn’t the best; WhoScored is handy, too, but the depth of FBref, and the historical dataset provided by Opta meant it was possible to analyse tens of thousands of players, and discern trends or anomalies.

Sean Forman founded Sports Reference in 2004, initially as a baseball statistics repository, before broadening its coverage to American football, basketball, ice hockey and soccer. The idea was to make sports and historical data more accessible. Experts quickly realised its value and began using it. John Henry, the owner of the Boston Red Sox and Liverpool, for example, used the play index on baseball reference, to filter his searches. General managers in American sports tended to use the website, in addition to their own bespoke, in-house platforms. Its user-friendly presentation meant that the casual fan could quite quickly check a fact or query things, while the budding analyst could be a bit more inventive.    The Boston Red Sox and Liverpool owner John W Henry Harold Cunningham/UEFA/UEFA via Getty FBref was, essentially, democratising football data. You need only look at social media nowadays to see the effect of this. There are writers across the world producing data visualisations and analyses by being inventive with publicly accessible data (which pales in comparison to the detailed and complex datasets that leading clubs use to inform their recruitment and match analysis). A few years ago, a student named Maram Albaharna, studying at university in London, produced data-led analysis. She was quickly snapped up by The Athletic and now works for Manchester City’s data department. In 2018, Karun Singh – a machine learning engineer – published an article titled “Introducing Expected Threat (xT)”. It was a provocative and novel idea that reimagined what was possible to produce with event data. He now works for Arsenal. A year later, Dundee United hired Ashwin Raman, a 17-year-old student who produced video and data analysis on Twitter. There are countless examples like these which show how the democratisation of data has been mutually beneficial for clubs, data organisations and fans.  Clubs and their over-worked data analysts or data scientists are often focused on projects, which leave little space for research and innovation. But the students or casual researchers have been pushing the boundaries of what it is possible to learn from simple datasets for years. In his book Net Gains, Ryan O’Hanlon, the American sports writer, writes: “The more people with access to data, the more likely someone is to discover something new about the sport.” However, with less public data available now that the “advanced” data has been withdrawn from FBref, the opportunity for people like Singh to publish similar work is reduced.  It’s not the only time something similar has happened: in 2020, ESPN Scrum – the first choice destination for rugby statistics – was taken down, leaving the casual rugby fan without access to detailed statistics.  Oval Insights are the premier data platform now, just like CricViz in cricket, but that data is inaccessible to the casual fan, and so the recruitment and data-led tactics remain a mystery to those without access. I do not think it is particularly important to get into the contractual agreement between FBref (which says Opta’s request to stop displaying their data was “unexpected”), and Opta. However, I think this affair raises a bigger and more pressing question: who should data belong to?  Is it the players that literally produce it; the clubs they are contracted to; the league(s) they operate in; the data collectors that classify and categorise it; or the fans that collectively facilitate the economy that makes all of this possible? The Opta data that was published on FBref was hardly the most advanced out there. Premier League clubs, for example, now use “optical tracking” to collect millions of data points each match, for every player on the field, rather than the “event data” that was on FBref which only recorded actions relating to players with the ball (which typically amounts to around 3,000 data points per game). Should the casual fan or budding analyst be able to access proprietary information, and develop their own interest in the game? Or should that pursuit of deeper understanding only be available to those with an expensive subscription? The value brought by casual analysts who have been snapped up by clubs and football data organisations over the past decade suggests that maybe a more open and democratic data scene is better for all.

 

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