Wednesday 4 June 2014

Bony better than Giroud - Player radars reveal how effective Bony really is

Just how good is Wilf? 


I could have just typed one word and hit publish in response to the above question; very.

However, in the interest of...well, typing some words, I thought I'd look a little deeper. Firstly, I called upon renowned interweb statistician Ted Knutson (of player statistical radar fame) and asked if he could produce a radar for Bony, showing his strengths and weaknesses, as well as comparing him to a similar PL striker.

Here's what Ted got back to me with, and boy does it prove a point! This first image shows Wilf's average contributions per ninety minutes:


Next up this radar compares him to Olivier Giroud - who a) plays in a very similar system and b) despite his critics actually enjoyed a decent season, scoring sixteen league goals and getting eight assists!



As you can see, Bony is stronger in almost all the aspects of his game that you'd want a striker to excel in. The only really notable stat that sees Giroud score higher is assists, and you could argue that with more lethal teammates to pass to that could skew the statistic in his favour. Also, these radars show non-penalty goals, and while that's brilliant for showing effectiveness in open play it does seem harsh that Bony's four penalties converted out of four attempted doesn't count in his favour statistically. Count those four in as opposed to the one (out of one, granted) scored by Giroud and it would twist the radar even further in Bony's favour.

You have to remember this isn't him compared against some makeweight striker who blundered through the season. Giroud had his best season in an Arsenal shirt, and while his form tailed off towards the end of the season sixteen Premier League goals, only one of which was a penalty, can't be sniffed at. With Wilfried Bony, as Ted Knutson points out, only twenty-five there's reason to be confident that next season he'll plunder even more goals - especially when you consider he obviously took time to adjust to his new club and the Premier League last season. It probably would have helped if he'd have played more before Christmas, mind you, but that's a debate best left for another time.

It's not like we needed stats to see that Bony really is a class act. Hopefully his stock doesn't rise too much in the World Cup, and he can return to SA1 focused on banging in an unheralded amount of goals for us next season. If he stays fit, there's no reason to believe he can't score what, twenty-five goals? He hit thirteen in his last nineteen games of the season, and given he just kind of bumbles about the pitch smashing defenders and the ball alternately towards the opposition goal, I can't see why he'd suffer from burn out at all. The only issue could be (and I just got really bummed out when I remembered this) the African Cup of Nations. 

Bony will be absent for just shy of a month as the Ivory Coast head to Morocco, and this could well be part of the thinking behind bringing in Luc Castaignos from Twente, who must, must be better than Alvaro Vazquez and his tragic predecessor Itay Shechter. I think we'll be operating with two up top for a large swathe of this coming season, so with Bony jetting off to Africa it's important we have some decent backup - or strike partner, depending on the formation - for Michu. I don't think the ACON will stop Bony though. The guy is a monster, and he's still young enough to improve considerably, which is a scary thought. 

Bony for top goalscorer next season? Apparently Kevin Phillips was the last man to finish top scorer when playing for a club outside of Liverpool, Manchester United, Manchester City, Arsenal or Chelsea, way back in the 1999/00 season. Given the current strikers playing in the Premiership, doing it next season would be some feat.

Thanks to Ted Knutson for providing the player radars used in this piece. Follow him on Twitter @mixedknuts and check out www.statsbomb.com for more interesting stattery.

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