Best players according to area of play: shining Ronaldo

Issue number 90 of the Big-5 Weekly Post presents the rankings for the best performing players since the start of the season according to the six key areas of play identified by the CIES Football Observatory: rigour, recovery, distribution, take on, chance creation and shooting.

Our rankings highlight not only the best performing players overall, but also those who performed the best with regard to teammates. This approach allows us to pick out more players who are not yet part of the top clubs. This is particularly useful from a scouting perspective. To limit bias, only footballers having played at least 66% of match time since the start of the season are included in the study.

In absolute terms, the best big-5 league players at present are Cristiano Ronaldo (Real Madrid) both in shooting and chance creation, Eden Hazard (Chelsea) in take on, Xabi Alonso (Bayern Munich) in distribution, Mathieu Coutadeur (Lorient) in recovery and Javi Manquillo (Liverpool) in rigour.

At the top of the relative rankings, we find Charlie Austin (QPR) in shooting, Xabi Prieto (Real Sociedad) in chance creation, Federico Cartabia (Córdoba) in take on, Roberto Trashorras (Rayo Vallecano) in distribution, Alaixys Romao (Marseille) in recovery and Mathieu Bodmer (Nice) in rigour.

Actors from professional clubs can contact us to enquire about our range of products in the domain of performance analysis.

Key performance indicators

• Shooting: ability to exploit goal opportunities through accurate shooting
• Chance creation: ability to putting teammates in a favourable position to score
• Take on: ability to create advantageous situations by successfully challenging opponents
• Distribution: ability to keep a hold on the game through efficient passing
• Recovery: ability to minimise opponents’ chances through proficient interception work

 

• Rigour: ability to minimise opponents’ chances through robust duelling