Field Report: Crystal Palace With the Ball

Deep Defenders: Sakho, Kouyate

No player is targeted with a pass less often than Chiekhou Kouayate. He sees .15 targets per minute and has received *6* progressive completions in the 5 full matches he has played so far this year.

This is not new. Last year I wrote a piece and included this graphic but didn't even realize until later that my axes were off and Kouyate was somewhere, abandoned, down south of the border and invisible. He is essentially not involved at all in open play with the ball.

Sakho progresses the ball 69 yards per ball loss (13th in league and alongside players like Joe Gomez or Rodri) while Kouyate is at 13 yards per ball loss (194th in the league and alongside Burnley high-ball bombers like Tarkowski, inefficient attackers like Moura, Zaha, or Pepe and strikers without outlets in front like Jimenez, Maupay, etc).

Deep Midfield/Deep Wide Players: McArthur, Ward, McCarthy, Mitchell

None of these players carry the ball, almost at all. McArthur gains 26% of his yardage through carries and that leads this group. The average PL player gains 36% of their yardage through carries, the average "deep" player is lower, down at 27% but the average Palace "deep" player is even lower, down at 18%. This is only ahead of Burnley.

Tyrick Mitchell is the only player from this group who shows much ball progression at all. McCarthy is even lower than Kouyate in yards gained per ball loss and only Jimmy Dunne is lower in the entire league among non-forward players*.

*Jeffrey Schlupp counts as a forward player here

If a manager was setting up his team trying to progress the ball, he would not choose McCarthy and Kouyate. Joel Ward's main role is to not stray too far past the halfway line and feed the ball up the wing, mostly to Townsend but sometimes to Ayew.

Ward has played every minute of Palace's 5 games and has 0 shots, 1 key pass, 1 penalty box touch and 1 completed pass into the penalty box.

Advanced Midfield/Advanced Wide: Schlupp, Townsend, Eze, Ayew

Once we get to this area of the pitch, the formerly cautious about carrying Palace side becomes super carry-happy, trailing only Saint-Maximin's Newcastle.

There is a clear division in terms of who is trusted or who the ball goes toward: Eze and Ayew get targeted about 60-70% more often than Schlupp and Townsend. Ayew mainly due to long balls (but he is 6/34 winning in aerial duels which indicates this might not be the best strategy) and Eze because he's actually been quite good at progressing the ball. Eze's gained 26 yards per ball loss compared to Schlupp's 8.6. Eze has also been quite a good receiver, 88% of passes intended for him are completed compared to 73% to Schlupp and 77% to Townsend.

He has lots of signs of being a very good player, but this might not be the right system. An isolated attack that requires players to make something from poor situations without support from midfielders or fullbacks limits the benefits you can get from a quality ball progressor. Eze has produced nothing in terms of goal work (3 pot shots and 1 key pass) and Palace's plan seems to just be "hey front 3, go figure something out". A team with a better and more advanced base is how Eze is playing right now but the numbers simply don't arrive.

Eze and Schlupp have played similar amounts of minutes

see a difference?

Pure Forward: Zaha

The only player listed to top 4 shots or 0.5 xG this year is Zaha, who is changing his role in really huge ways. The past 2 seasons he has been around 4.4 successful dribbles per 90, so far this season has completed 2, total, in 5 games. He's picking up about half the carry yardage he used to as well, life as a center forward requires different skills. Life as a center forward is supposed to get you into the box more, but that isn't working. Zaha's penalty box touches per game the last 4 years

7.7 -> 7.3 -> 6.2 -> 3.6.

He is at 0.12 non-penalty expected goals and has 3 key passes.

The entire Palace setup is a disaster. They've nullified their best threat, are playing 2 total passengers at the back in McCarthy and Kouyate, and then two in Ward and Schlupp who only occasionally offer backseat driving advice. Lineups with those 4 are essentially forfeiting the right to any attempt at sustained attack and none seem to be very good counter-attackers either.

Some sort of left sided attack seems like it should hypothetically be dangerous with Mitchell, Eze and Zaha but there needs to be in the box at the end of it. The numbers are just very short no matter where you look for Palace, a team in serious trouble.

Whatever happened to Max Meyer , not my proudest tweets or moments. Once Upon a Time in Schalke he was involved as a midfielder playing short passes out left to set up shots. Can we see that tried again? Something...please.