Charlie Adam has had a very poor run of form in recent months. We’ve got some brief stats together to show that maybe, just maybe, Charlie Adam is turning a corner this season. So without taking up too much of your time lets get straight into the statistics.
Creativity
Creativity is a major part of Charlie’s game. It’s the one attribute that he’s been bought for, especially from set pieces, as his corners were worth “£10m alone” if you believe a rival manager (trying to push the fee up, we know your tricks old foe!). So let’s have a look at how Charlie got on in games after winning at Chelsea. We’ve picked this set of games because of a trend we’ve noticed.
[table id=30 /]
As you can see from the table above Charlie Adam created 12 chances, in eleven games. Yes you read that right: ELEVEN games. A poor number averaging to just over one in each game. Five of them were in open play (one assist included) and seven were set plays (one assist included).
Passing
During these games Charlie Adam achieved a pass accuracy was of 78.8% – respectable but plenty of room for improvement. Included below are his passing figures for zones during this time period.
So in his own half Adam achieved an average of 90% pass accuracy, in the opposition’s half an accuracy of 60% and in the final third an accuracy of 67%. How he’s managed to do better in the final third is beyond us but those are the figures for Charlie Adam. Plenty of room for improvement especially as he was losing the ball in the middle of the park so much as can be seen by his 60% accuracy. Again not good enough.
Tackling
Here are the tackling stats that Adam achieved during that poor run of form:
[table id=32 /]
The averages for the three attributes, tackling, ground duels and aerial duels, are all beneath 70%. Although these figures are respectable you will see that there is room for improvement and that Charlie has improved in recent weeks (the whole point of this article).
So moving on to his last three games against Wolves, Tottenham and Manchester United.
Recent Creativity
[table id=31 /]
It seems as though Charlie Adam got a right good kick up the rear after the Bolton game as since then he’s created twelve chances, including two assists. So he’s matched the previous eleven games in two and a bit games (he was a substitute against Manchester United). That’s quite impressive and he’s managed it against Tottenham and United so no complaints that the teams are weaker etc.
Recent Passing
Charlie Adam’s open play pass accuracy has also improved to 82.4% in these last few games too. A sign of improvement then? (Yes, we know it’s a small set of data but we’re just showing you what we’ve noticed.)
There’s an improvement in all areas of passing (as seen in the diagram above). Adam manages 92% pass accuracy in his own half, 72% in opposition’s half and 72% in the final third. Definite improvement in the middle third there, a full 12%. It seems as though he’s now making more simple passes around the pitch.
Recent Tackling
Adam’s recent tackling stats are shown below with an impressive performance at United when it came to tackling (even though he was only a substitute).
[table id=33 /]
Again there is improvement here in Charlie Adam’s ground duels and tackles. Ground Duels especially are way up on the 48% that he achieved in the previous eleven games. The only drop is in the aerial duels where he has won 3 out of 5 in the last two and a bit games.
So overall there are some signs that Charlie Adam may be getting into some form, I accept that the data used for his up turn is considerably smaller than the data used to show his poor form but that’s all that is available at the moment.
The point was to show Liverpool fans that he is beginning to come back into a little bit of form since the telling off they got after Bolton and that we believe he should start with Steven Gerrard in central midfield against Cardiff. He’s got a creative side, a combative side and he could be useful in a side that has Bellamy and Suarez running into the channels.
All of the Opta stats used in this article are from the brand new Quick Player Season Stats section. You can subscribe by clicking here: Subscribe Now!
