What do the numbers tell us about our new frontman?
Alvaro Vazquez scoring a hat-trick in the Copa Del Rey
I won't be alone in knowing next to nothing about Swansea's newest addition to the squad, but when it was announced that the Swans had secured Getafe's Alvaro Vazquez on loan for the season it brought a smile to my face - if only because it meant we wouldn't be signing Peter Odemwingie or David N'Gog.
With that in mind I thought I'd turn to the internet to see what statistics I could dig up to hopefully give us some idea of what to expect. Given I'm yet to find a reliable source of information for previous season's statistics it's proved quite a struggle, but I've managed to put something together.
Alvaro (as he's normally more simply known) was born in Barcelona and was a product of the Espanyol youth system. He progressed into the first team by the age of 19 and his main claim to fame during his time there was scoring a hat-trick which saw him help his team through to the quarter finals of the Copa Del Rey.
In the summer of 2012 Getafe paid £2.6million for the striker who'd shown a lot of promise for the Spanish youth teams, and he's continued to feature for them - picking up a winners' medal in this summer's European U21 Championship. Despite being 22. You have to love football.
If we're looking at recent stats, last season he featured 31 times (16 starts) and only scored 5 goals. In his breakthrough season he scored 4 goals, before grabbing five the season before last too, so at least he's consistent...
One area he does seem to have improved in is shooting accuracy. In his first season he managed 11 of 31 shots on target (35.48%), followed by 14 out of 39 (35.89%) the season after and 14 out of 30 (46.67%) last season. A steady improvement and getting almost half your shots on target isn't bad for a young striker. The lack of goals isn't encouraging but at least the boy knows where the goal is. Having said that, this season in his only appearance (as a 62nd minute substitute) he had three shots and none of them were on target. Stats, eh?
Given the frequency of his appearance as a substitute last season he averaged a goal every 288 minutes last year, which really is actually a lot more respectable than the stats suggest. For example, Michu averaged one every 167 minutes last year, so while it's not great it's definitely not that bad. Sadly, I've been unable to find any passing statistics for last season, but at around 6 foot tall we'll have to hope he's capable of holding the ball up and linking play when needed.
Let's hope we see him replicate some of the finishing in the video above, and that we get the most out of a player who Laudrup clearly rates. Beinvenido, Alvaro!
Let's hope we see him replicate some of the finishing in the video above, and that we get the most out of a player who Laudrup clearly rates. Beinvenido, Alvaro!