World Cup Most Passes Gained By Position, Attackers
So this is a simple post, mostly numbers and charts and minimal analysis. How I calculated "most passes gained":
assigned every WC pass into one of 30 "types", seen below:
2. Calculated completion% for each type.
3. Compared player's completion% for each type pass to the overall completion% to see how many "completions gained" he had. So for example, pass cluster 4 (the short pass forward in the right attacking half is completed at 72% rate. If a player attempted 10 of these and completed 8, he would be credited with 0.8 completions gained.
I never view these as "player skill" but more how a team expresses itself.
Attacking Players (Those whose passes started within 40 yards of goal: 16 players with 40+ passes)
Very few players in this group.
Mesut Ozil +12 completions (7% above average in percentage terms)
The bluer the color, the better than average that type of pass was for Ozil.
3. Raheem Sterling +4 completions (3% above average)
Now this is a fascinating case. Sterling was the hot-topic on stats twitter during the World Cup as he was bashed for producing essentially nothing by many fans and credited for linking and producing much of England's attack with his movement by much of stats twitter without evidence in response to what they viewed as racially tinged attacks over the years. This map kind of gives credence to both sides. While Sterling rated as one of the best "forwards" in passes gained, they all come from the blue marks, basically in midfield. Then when it's time to move the ball into the box Sterling was a big negative. Now of course all these maps (as with ~everything in soccer stats) are about the entire network around a player and not individual profiles, and that should be in mind for every player, but this map revealed a lot to me.
Attacking Players Level 2 (Those whose passes started 40-45 yards of goal: 54 players with 40+ passes)
A big reminder of positional effects here and limits of this type of model telling you about individual passing skill without intertwining all kinds of other effects. Good thing this isn't measuring passing skill but illuminating the World Cup.
Isco +27 completions (+6% vs average)
Heavy volume in the mid-attacking left side.
2. Jesse Lingard +18 completions (+8% vs avg)
Actually seemed to pass better the closer to goal he got.
3. Philippe Coutinho +18 completions (+6% vs avg)
A varied profile here as he was all up and down the left side, but extremely strong at passing into the box.
Now for the bottom of the list.
Ante Rebic -22 completions (-17% vs avg)
Antoine Griezmann -19 completions (-9% vs avg)
Team effects, guys out there for shots? Bad passing numbers can't be gotten around. I could not believe the transfer rumors for Rebic after watching him closely due to my DraftKings lineups hinging on him a couple times, these numbers make me even more puzzled.
Attacking Players Level 3 (Those whose passes started 45-50 yards of goal: 80 players with 40+ passes)
Toni Kroos +28 completions (+9% vs avg)
2. Axel Witsel +17 completions (+6% vs avg)
Quite different profiles for Witsel and Kroos, probably caused by Germany's extreme field tilt basically at all times.
Hopefully I can find some players who stick out amongst their teams in a future post. The problem with diving into data like this is you get 20 ideas for every one post you put out. Next though I keep going further back from goal. Dividing wide players from central players is not something I am doing for the sake of simplicity now.