I haven’t written anything for far too long ( Â a four letter word called work ) so thought I’d have a look at something that has been a pretty big topic of conversation in the Premier League as we get to the business end of the season, just which team are actually a one man team ?
For the record, these numbers have been compiled over the w/e of 2/3 March and are inclusive of the North London Derby and Bale and Walcott’s influence in the goals for both teams.
I decided to look at goals and assists of each club’s players, find out what player from each club is involved in both actual goals by scoring them and assisting them. I calculated these figures by awarding two points per goals scored, and one point for each assist made. For West Ham for example, they have scored a total of 30 goals so I doubled that total to reach 60.
So if ( if only ) West Ham had a player that had scored all 30 of our goals this season, he would have reached a maximum of 100% and the 60 points.
However West Ham haven’t, and Kevin Nolan scored 12 points for his six goals and 2 points for his two assists giving a points score of 14. So Nolan had a total influence of 14 out of a possible 60, giving Nolan and West Ham a rating of 23.3% where the one man team argument goes which, for the record, is the second lowest in the entire Premier League and only behind Norwich and Grant Holt. It makes interesting reading this and may dispel a few myths as usual.
I decided to split the table into three, because that is actually how the Premier League is anyway, three different leagues within one. The top 7, the relegation contenders and the middle of the table.
So first off, the top of the table.
No real surprises there, especially where the top 3 of Suarez, Bale and RVP are concerned but it will back up or dismantle many Public House conversations, I’m sure.
At the bottom, Benteke’s influence for Villa is in my opinion, pretty alarming. They are massively reliant on him and really need more contribution from other areas of the team where goal scoring is concerned in the run in to the end of the season.
The middle of the road Guys, with Swansea’s Michu and WBA’s on loan Lukaku aside, seem to find goals from lots of areas of their team and are much less reliant on any single player it seems.
We haven’t included Newcastle in this as their goals this season have been heavily influenced by Demba Ba, a player that hasn’t been at the Club for two months.
So overall it’s Aston Villa who are the most reliant on a single player in the BPL, with Liverpool, Southampton, Tottenham and Manchester United trailing them.
For the top teams, it’s very simple. The players in question are world-class and are amongst some of the best players in the world. For the other teams and especially those at the bottom of the table fighting relegation and especially Aston Villa, i think it’s worrying times.
[box_light]All of the stats from this article have been taken from the Opta Stats Centre at EPLIndex.com – Subscribe Now (Includes author privileges!) Check out our new Top Stats feature on the Stats Centre which allows you to compare all players in the league & read about new additions to the stats centre.[/box_light]
