Finding the best under-25 Forwards from Europe’s Top 5 leagues
With over half the season completed around the top 5 European leagues , there have been plenty of well known players and some new upcoming talents who have done well. I have done an analysis using statistics to find forwards who have performed well. For the purpose of this analysis to know players who still haven’t reached their peak , I have excluded players above the age of 25. Forwards who have played at least 1000 minutes are considered. This analysis also contains a few wingers who have played certain games as a forward. All the stats used in this analysis have been taken from fbref.com .
Dribbling
With the evolution of tactics over the years , Forwards now aren’t what they used to be. The modern game requires Forwards to be comfortable with the ball at their feet and with good technical and dribbling abilities.
This graph shows Successful % of dribbles vs. Attempted dribbles per 90.
Marcus Rashford has attempted 4.82 dribbles per 90 with a successful rate of 60.6% so far this season. Mason Greenwood has attempted 3.98 dribbles per 90 with a success rate of 55.6%. Lucas Boye has attempted 3.69 dribbles with a success rate of 55%. Erling Haaland has the highest success rate of 73.10% but he attempts only 1.6 dribbles per 90. Patrik Schick also has a high success rate of dribbles.
Touches in Penalty Area
This graph shows the number of touches a forward takes inside the opposition penalty area with touches ranging from low to high with red representing low and blue representing high.
As can be seen from the graph , Lautaro Martinez has the highest touches inside the penalty area per 90 with 7.56 touches. Erling Haaland has the second highest touches inside the penalty area with 7.20 touches per 90. Timo Werner , who is finding it quite difficult at Chelsea , still has 6.95 touches. Alexander Isak is also producing 6 touches inside the penalty area per 90.
Aerial duels
Forwards with good aerial ability give their teams an extra route to break tight opposition defences. This graph shows Aerial duels won per 90 vs. Aerial duels won percentage.
Oliver McBurnie has done quite well in this metric. This might be due to the style of play of Sheffield United. He has won 10.1 aerial duels per 90 with a total success rate of 55.7%. Tammy Abraham has the highest success rate with 58.7% and he wins about 3.27 aerial duels per 90. Sasa Kalajdzic has a win percentage of 56.80% and he wins 5.16 of his aerial duels. Moise Kean doesn’t go for much aerial duels but he has a success percentage of 54.2% and wins about 0.95 aerial duels per 90.
Pressures
This graph shows the Pressures attempted per 90 vs. Successful pressures per 90.
Jonathan David has attempted 18.10 pressures per 90 and won 5.60 pressures per 90. Josh Sargent has attempted 18.70 pressures and has 5.22 successful pressures per 90. Oliver McBurnie attempts 20 pressures per 90 and has 4.05 successful pressures per 90. Other notable names are M’Bala Nzola and Taiwo Awoniyi.
Tackles
This Graph shows Tackles attempted per 90 vs. Tackles won per 90.
Tino Kadewere attempts 1.9 tackles per 90 and wins 1.17 of those per 90. Youssef En-Nesyri attempts 1.32 tackles per game and wins 1.05 of those per 90.
Expected Goals and Assists
This graph shows xA per 90 vs. xG per 90 .
Erling Haaland has an xA per 90 of 0.19 and an xG per 90 of 0.88. He is clearly ahead of others in this metric. Lautaro Martinez , Che Adams and Sasa Kalajdzic all have an xA of 0.21 per 90. Alexander Isak has an xG of 0.68 per 90.
Goals and Assists
This graph shows the assists per 90 vs. goals scored per 90.
Erling Haaland is clearly ahead of almost everyone as he almost scores 1 goal per 90. Marcus Rashford has the highest assists per 90 with 0.27 assists per 90. Other good performers with a good value of assist per 90 and goals per 90 are Lautaro Martinez , Sasa Kalajdzic and Alexander Isak.
Shots
This Graph shows the shots taken per 90 vs. shots on target per 90.
Lautaro Martinez comes out on top with 4.16 shots taken per 90 and 1.59 of them on target. Haaland takes 3.41 shots per 90 and 1.8 of them are on target. Alexander Isak attempts 3.3 shots per 90 and 1.58 of them are on target. Calvert-Lewin takes 2.71 shots per 90 and has 1.61 of his shots on target.
Shot and Goal creating actions
This graph shows a plot of shot creating actions per 90 vs. goal creating actions per 90. Any action that leads to a shot is Shot creating action and any action that leads to a goal is a Goal creating action.
Timo Werner has a Goal creation action per 90 of 0.69 and a shot creating action of 2.9 per 90. Tino Kadewere has a GCA per 90 of 0.62 and a SCA per 90 of 2.52. Rashford has a high SCA per 90 of 3.05. Jonathan David also has 3.09 SCA per 90.
The Top Performers
Lautaro Martinez and Erling Haaland seem to be clear top performers. Lautaro seems to take a lot of shots and most of them are on target. That shows that the chances he is getting are of good quality and he has a great movement inside the box which makes it easier for him to shoot on target. He has the highest number of touches inside the penalty area out of all the other players considered in this analysis. Haaland isn’t far behind him. Haaland almost scores one goal a game. This shows that his finishing is really good. He also takes plenty of shots and most of his shots are on target just like Lautaro.
Sasa Kalajdzic of Stuttgart may not be as popular as the above two but he is producing some really good underlying numbers. His xA per 90 is 0.21 , meanwhile his xG per 90 is 0.43. He scores 0.82 goals per 90. He takes 3.35 shots per 90 and 1.23 of those are on target. He also has an SCA per 90 of 2.86. Due to his Height , he has a great Aerial Duel success rate. His market value according to Tranfermakt is around 6.6m Euros which is really good for clubs with limited budget.
Youssef En-Nesyri is another player who is performing really well this season. He has scored 13 goals in 14 starts in La Liga. He scores 0.86 goals per 90. He has a successful aerial duel percentage of 57%.
Timo Werner may look like he is finding it difficult in the Premier League but his underlying numbers are decent. With the managerial change and different style of play in Bundesliga and the Premier League, he is just going through a period of adjusting. His GCA per 90 is 0.69 and his SCA per 90 is 2.9 which shows that he is very much involved in the final third. Its his finishing which has been below par this season.
Another player who is not under much limelight is Alexander Isak. He takes 3.31 shots per 90 and 1.58 of them are on target. He also has an xG of 0.68. He has a dribble success rate per 90 of 64.5%. With recent rumors coming up that Barcelona are interested in signing him , he may very well be a great purchase for any club that buys him in the next few seasons.
