With Bony departing for Man City, how good is the man set to step up to replace him?
Since Bafetimbi Gomis' arrival at the Swans, he's had limited time with which to impress his new set of supporters. Of late though he's had a run in the team and definitely benefited as a result, while Wilfried Bony's departure gives him the opportunity to feature week in, week out until the season's end.
With that in mind, I thought it would be interesting to see how he fared when compared to Bony statistically, as they are clearly very different players. We'll just look at Premier League stats, as detailed coverage of other competitions isn't available, and when Gomis has played (and scored) in the cup it's been against Tranmere & Rotherham, so it wouldn't be accurate to compare that with Premier League competition.
Firstly, if you look at goals it's obviously not going to compare well. Gomis has just one - Mark Noble having been credited with an own-goal in Saturday's match against West Ham - while Wilf has nine. Key passes though is almost identical, Gomis with 1.16 per game and Wilf with 1.18, and given how Bony has become a central figure in our attacks that's a very encouraging statistic for Gomis to be replicating.
Average pass length is an interesting stat, but with Gomis coming in 12.29m and Bony at 13.70m I can't say I think there's much to be inferred there. My own opinion is that Gomis wants the ball whilst accelerating at defenders, while Bony much prefers playing with his back to goal before arriving in the box with a well timed run.
Shot accuracy doesn't make good reading for the Frenchman. On target with just 23% it's less than half Bony's 54%, but you have to remember we're comparing Gomis against the top Premier League goalscorer in 2014. Gomis actually averages more shots per ninety minutes, albeit marginally, with 4.62 per ninety minutes to Bony's 4.58, while he successfully takes on an opponent 2.02 times a game, around double the 1.04 Bony averages,
The statistics paint a picture that will be in line with what anyone who's seen him in his time so far will attest - that he's a very different player to Bony. It's natural there'll be a period where we adjust to Gomis being the main man up front, because he plays in a completely different way. After a bedding in period Wilf came very good and I see no reason to assume that, given an importance to the team on a par with Bony's over the last twelve months, Gomis won't come good either.
A quick further mentions on takeons - Gomis is successful with 51.85% while Bony averages a higher percentage of 61.18%. Gomis clearly tries to beat his man a lot more, in fact he's done it 14 times this season - only one less than Wilf despite accumulating less than half the amount of game time Bony has (623 minutes to 1296).
Aerially Gomis stands tall too, winning 2.17 duels per ninety. Wilf averages more - 3.54 - but he's a freak so to give it some context I checked Diego Costa (1.25 per ninety), Giroud (3.09), Dzeko (2.87) and Harry Kane (1.74). Gomis is far from the best in the league in terms of getting his head to the ball, but with a run in the team you'd expect his average to improve and I'd also refer to my original point in that he seems to want the ball in very different positions to Bony, more often than not on the floor.
Pass completion next. Gomis is on his own here, in a good way, with 83% pass completion - higher than Bony (77%) and all the aforementioned forwards. He averages 18.64 passes per ninety, which is around seven less than all four strikers I compared with. Bony averages the most at 25.14, Costa comes in at 22.86, while Kane & Giroud fall in between. That again backs up what I've said that we need to feed him into the channel, as he's not looking to be a targetman - not in the traditional sense anyway.
Personally after taking a while to warm to him I am genuinely excited by the prospect of Gomis up front. He adds a dimension we haven't had in a while, a striker who wants to turn and face the defender before going past him and finishing. Wilf was (anyone regular readers of this blog will know I in no way mean this negatively) much more "Give it here! BANG! Goal."
It seem that statistically the only thing missing is goals. Given the improving nature of his performances of late, we shouldn't be waiting long.
All stats sourced from Squawka.com