7 Comments
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Stephen McGeoch's avatar

This is a cracking article. I always enjoy this sort of thing because it provides an entertaining and interesting framework for discussion. I think it’s really good the way your analysis has identified the outstanding performances by unheralded players.

Btw, isn’t the scouting and acquisition of Claudio Braga by Hearts the wake-up call for Scottish football at the dawn of the age of data and analytics?

I’m sure everyone who reads it will have an opinion on the methodology. Fwiw, my tuppence worth is that it might be useful to split the midfielders into DMs and AMs. Firstly, they have different skill sets, and secondly, the resulting team selection would probably better represent the actual systems used by the clubs.

Martin Donnelly's avatar

Nygren has 14 goals from midfield. Surely he makes the 2nd XI at least

RhiCam's avatar

Nygren wasn’t a million miles away, 8th highest ranked overall.

It was mainly the defensive indexes that let him down. He also didn’t rank too highly for Progressive Passing which I weighted quite highly for midfielders. He was the highest ranked in Goal Threat though, which isn’t much of a surprise.

sean's avatar

Not a single Celtic midfielder there isn’t surprising but it is shocking.

Scotland's Coefficient's avatar

100%. I do fantasy football and find it hard to pick Celtic players in most positions. Which is mad given they still favourites for the title. Nygren has been the most consistent in terms of fantasy points but in reality he's underwhelmed a lot of Celtic fans I think

Joel's avatar

Great to see some stats, and definitely some surprises!

Julie Bones's avatar

Really interesting. Rangers fans would be surprised about the Raskin finding ... but the stats are there.