Orta’s Power Five: Left Backs
Greetings & Salutations, welcome to the 4th edition of Orta’s Power Five, a series where I look to try to predict some of the names on Orta’s little notebook of potential signings for Leeds United. I will attempt to find these players using data driven analysis of the top 5 European Leagues.
All of the previous editions in this series have been in positions where we haven’t actually needed to sign someone, so this article in particular is more relevant to our current transfer activity.
We only have two players who are currently playing at Left Back regularly. Stuart Dallas & Ezgjan Alioski. Dallas has played 18 of his 29 appearances at either RB or LB with the remaining appearances being in CM, while Alioski has played nearly every minute of his games at LB.
This is one data set that I haven’t covered in great detail in any of my previous articles as such I am looking forward to what the data says about our Gjanni & Stuart and if they are holding up against the rest of the division’s left backs.
Firstly one of the prime capabilities of our fullbacks on both sides is ball progression through both passing & ball carrying. Lets see how our two boys hold up.
As you can see above both Dallas & Alioski are in the top left quadrant, they aren’t in the far corner of this area but are still in the area. You will notice most of the players in this top corner are from the big 6 clubs. Our boys are performing significantly better in terms of progression than the majority of the league.
We can see here that Dallas is significantly better than Alioski at progressive passing with 5 to Alioski’s 4, whereas there is only a slight difference in their progressive carries with Alioski slightly ahead with 5.5 to Dallas’ 5.16.
It is pretty clear that progression is a big deal for the bigger clubs in the league and the ones who want to play an “attractive” style of football. There are exceptions of course but the majority of the above average players come from bigger teams or positive attacking teams, this will definitely be a stat I will look at for my targets.
Next lets look at how involved the players are in the final 3rd.
Once again we can see that both players are in the best quadrant in the top right this time. Both very active in the final 3rd with both ball carrying & passing.
In Bielsa’s team the fullbacks are used not only in the buildup but they are key parts of the final parts of the attack too. Both players are very similar for Final 3rd passes with 3.78(Alioski) & 3.8(Dallas) while Dallas is a little stronger for Ball carries with 2.15 to Alioski’s 1.8.
This graph shows a lot more variance in where the players from the top 6 are however the best in both categories still goes to players in top 6 clubs, so once again clearly a desirable ability to have at the top level of English football. Shout out’s to Fulham’s Antonee Robinson with 3.2 Final 3rd Carries who is only 2nd best to Luke Shaw with 3.29.
My final visual to show off our players is looking at Penalty box entries from both crossing & passing.
Here we see this time just Alioski in the desirable quadrant, Dallas is let down in this visual by his crosses. He only makes 0.29 completed crosses to Alioski’s 0.56 which is double what Dallas has. It is worth baring in mind however that Dallas is right footed so will find it more difficult to cross than Alioski will.
There is a couple of interesting players in these visual’s. Firstly Masuaku is the best in the league at crossing volume with 1.06 completed crosses followed by Fulham’s Antonee Robinson with 0.95. The best for passing is clearly Joao Cancelo by a long distance with 2.7 passes to penalty area with the closest to him being Alex Telles with 2.1.
This is clearly an area we could improve at, while Alioski shows good here it is quite likely he is leaving the club this summer with noises that Galatasaray are interested in the Macedonian.
So we have identified that the players we need to look to target will be strong at progressing the ball either through passing or ball carrying(Preferably both) and that the player replacing Alioski should be a proficient crosser.
With the above in mind the below visual looks at total progression from both carrying & passing on one side and the other looks at penalty box entries from crossing.
Also the size of the dot relates to tackles & Interceptions as this is another factor we need to consider.
I am not targeting players in Premier League as they tend to be over priced in comparison to the rest of the European League’s. In addition no players older than 25 are being considered as Dallas is on the wrong side of 20 we need a younger player to compliment him.
I have identified the players I feel are good targets & are realistic. There are others in the visual who are better fits but they wouldn’t realistically move to a club of our current stature.
Below is the 5 players I have selected with all their stats compared.
There is a lot of information to break down in the above, each player has their own strength’s and weaknesses.
The player I like the most is Maximillian Mittelstadt, he completes a lot of progressive passes, final 3rd passes & also is a beast defensively. In addition to his tackles & interceptions he completes 16.2 pressures p90 which is more than Dallas(15p90) but it is less than Alioski(19.4p90), he comes from a squad who are very pressy, Hertha BSC complete the 4th most pressures in the Bundesliga and this should mean he’ll be a good fit for us physically.
Max is 24 years old which is a great age, he will have a lot of resale value which is always a good thing to have in a transfer for a club of our stature. Max is valued at £7mil and came through the ranks in Hertha’s youth setup.
Hertha’s record departure stands at £20mil for Valentino Lazaro, I would expect Max’s fee to be of a similar value to Lazaro’s given his performances & that he is a home grown talent. We could be looking at £20-£30mil to sign him but it would be a worthwhile signing, he would have a fellow German compatriot in Robin Koch to help him settle into the side.
In addition Max has versatility to his name, he has played in Defensive Midfield & Central Midfield this season but primarily he has played at LB. I watched a game against Bayern Munich which Hertha lost 0–1 where he played at LB and I have to say he impressed me. He likes to get forward, plays one two’s with good efficiency. He had a lot to do defensively in this game and was tasked with marking Leroy Sane, he limited Sane to only 1 key pass, no completed crosses and only one carry to the Penalty area.
In this game Max was very active, he attempted 4 dribbles past players and had 100% success rate, he had 6 progressive passes(Most for Hertha), 4 final third passes(Joint most for Hertha), 121 yards progressive carry distance(2nd most for Hertha)& 252 Yards progressive pass distance(3rd most for Hertha).
Max hasn’t got any reoccurring injury concerns and in the last 2 seasons he has only missed 5 games with 4 of these due to a bout of Mononucleosis and wasn’t fitness related.
Going by the stats any of the players I’ve identified seem good fits for us and below is how much they may set us back should we go for them.
Another name I’d like to pick out for discussion is Romain Perraud, the main reason for this is because he has already been identified as a target of ours by Phil Hay. Perraud looks to be the cheapest amongst the options above and seems quite likely to be the player we go for.
Perraud actually came through the academy of OGC Nice and was bought by Paris FC for a tiny fee of 135k. He was then bought by Brest for only £1.35m. He has appearances for France U20,U19,U18 & U17. He has yet to make his senior appearance for France national team and given the competition ahead of him he’s going to need a lot of development to reach those levels and who else is better suited than Marcelo Bielsa to help him reach that potential?
Perraud has 92 senior appearances to his name with 54 of these being at Ligue 1 with Stade Brest and the rest at Ligue 2 with Paris FC/OGC Nice. He has played most of his football at LB but does have 5 appearances as a winger. He is a naturally left footed player which is what we want from our LB so he can more easily cross the ball.
Romain is quite an active player both in defence and attack, he completes 13 pressures, 2.29 tackles & 2.15 blocks p90. He takes more shots than the average LB does with 1.3 shots per90 which is a similarity he shares with Alioski who takes 1.1 p90. He creates 2.12 shots and this season he has 5 assists & 3 goals to his name.
Romain also plays for a very pressy team, Brest complete the 2nd most pressures in Ligue 1 which again will mean his transition to our squad’s style should be quite seamless.
In closing I’m quite excited to see who we bring into the squad in this position, it’s a position we have struggled with for the last few seasons, we haven’t really had a true LB in the position since Charlie Taylor left for Burnley and an improvement in this position could really help us in other areas of the pitch.
Nailing this position will mean that Stuart Dallas can be free’d up to take up the position in CM which he has become so good at in recent fixtures. I will be sad to see Alioski go if he does leave this Summer and wish him all the best at wherever he ends up.
Have we found any of the players that Victor Orta has on his little notebook? Only the man himself will know for sure. If you’re reading Victor hit me up and let me know how I did.
The next instalment of Orta’s Power Five will look at Wingers, Rather than breaking this one down by Left & Right I will just look at all wide options who could fit into our style.
