Academy Task 5: Defensive Midfielder Deep Dive

[AustinP0027]

Looking for a deep dive topic for Academy Task 5, I figure that the best chance to understand the league is to understand the position I’ve created, Defensive Midfielder. And the best way to really understand that position is to look at the players who have played it before.

I’m limiting the data to S18 and onwards.  First, because massive amounts of data makes it harder to parse through for trends. Secondly, there was talking in the discord chat about how in S18, changes were made to make stadiums neutral instead of Home/Away which appear to have evened out win rates. With that in mind, it felt like a natural boundary for player stats as well.

And so, with the data from S18 till now, and the list filtered down only to anyone who has DM in their position options, we can take a look!

First, my curiosity leads me to ask, what other positions have Defensive Midfielders been taking? You can take multiple positions eventually, so what are people headed towards?

Top 10 Position Combos along with DM

Position Combo	Count
M/AM (C )	129
D (C ), M (C )	96
D (RC)	89
D (LC)	53
D (C ), ST (C )	13
M (LC)	11
D/WB ®	11
D/WB (L)	9
WB ®, M (C )	8
M (RC)	6

Some interesting meta information appeared immediately. There’s already a strong push towards Defensive Midfielders picking up the ability to play midfield on both sides. That’s fairly logical, as the real difference on the field between those two spots doesn’t seem that significant. There was a mix of Defensive back and Wing Back in there also, which makes more sense to me. If you’re playing defense, learn to play all the defensive spots. Then there are the 13 players who took Striker. I mean….Come on! Don’t abandon your roots for the temptation that is scoring goals. Be strong my fellow defensive-people!

Seeing the Index positions led me to wondering what the players actually chose as their primary player position, so I dug that up as well.

Top 10 Primary Positions for DM roles

Primary Position	Count
CDM	38
CD	34
CM	23
LWB	5
LD	5
RD	4
ST	3
RAM	2
LM	2
CAM	2

That’s not too bad of a look. The highest segment of the players that have the Defensive Midfield role are actually Defensive Midfielders! Defensive Backs are second, and Central Midfielders are 3rd.

What can I take from this as I want to sort through data? It’s clear that the positions recorded in the index aren’t the primary factor you would look at if you’re trying to truly filter down to your position. You need the Player Position, so that’s where I’ll go next for a filter.

But a quick aside, I did look up the players who started as Strikers but have purchased the DM position. Two were DM/AM/ST, and the other was DM, M, ST. Interesting to see for sure, and I’m going to welcome you all to the club because you started on offense but saw the light and moved your way back to defense.

Filtering down to only the Player Position of CDM, and now I have the data I think I want. Players who created as a Defensive Midfielder, regardless of what other positions they have picked up along the way.

With that I also filtered down to what I consider the defensive stats, mainly things around: headers, passes, presses, tackles, blocks, clearances, interceptions, shots blocked, and dribbles. Then I also included some fun ones like founds, offsides, the different cards, distance run, and of course, average rating.

Groupings
When I originally started, I thought I would bucket data into 1st season, 2nd through 4th, and 5th and above. In the process of collecting data, getting 1st season correctly with Academy data with, and having the seasons show up appropriate with the regular index made a giant mess that I wasn’t going to untangle yet. So, instead, my groupings are 2nd season, 3rd and 4th Season, and 5+ Season.

Finally, I took the averages of the stats for those groups.

Headers

Group	Player Count	Attempted Headers	Successful Headers	Header %
SeasonCount = 2	4	81.50	27.75	40.62
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	253.69	126.77	45.72
SeasonCount >= 5	14	422.43	199.36	46.89

Passing

Group	Player Count	Attempted Passes	Successful Passes	Pass %	Key Passes	Open Play Key Passes	Progressive Passes
SeasonCount = 2	4	865.25	751.25	86.93	13.75	12.00	77.25
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	2370.08	2081.69	87.45	47.46	38.00	219.00
SeasonCount >= 5	14	4405.07	3843.07	87.05	125.93	120.14	451.64

Pressing

Group	Player Count	Attempted Presses	Successful Presses	Press %
SeasonCount = 2	4	115.75	37.50	32.71
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	320.38	105.31	32.87
SeasonCount >= 5	14	820.93	265.50	32.61

Tackling

Group	Player Count	Attempted Tackles	Tackle %	Tackles Won	Key Tackles
SeasonCount = 2	4	54.50	73.11	38.50	13.00
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	131.85	73.95	94.15	14.38
SeasonCount >= 5	14	265.07	73.06	194.14	18.29

Defense

Group	Player Count	Blocks	Clearances	Interceptions	Mistakes Leading to Goals
SeasonCount = 2	4	13.50	51.50	28.00	1.25
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	35.15	80.77	93.38	1.54
SeasonCount >= 5	14	59.64	114.07	199.79	3.50

Possession / Movement

Group	Player Count	Dribbles	Distance Run (km)
SeasonCount = 2	4	9.50	223.88
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	23.15	609.63
SeasonCount >= 5	14	88.86	1270.66

Attacking

Group	Player Count	Goals	Goals Outside Box	Shots Blocked	xA	xG	Pen Adj xG	xG Overperformance
SeasonCount = 2	4	1.00	0.25	8.00	1.33	1.51	1.51	-0.51
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	2.69	1.15	22.15	4.87	3.85	3.72	-1.15
SeasonCount >= 5	14	10.36	2.93	33.29	15.63	11.91	11.91	-1.55

Discipline

Group	Player Count	Fouls	Fouls Against	Offsides	Red Cards	Yellow Cards
SeasonCount = 2	4	17.50	8.25	1.00	0.00	3.25
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	60.08	18.00	1.85	0.08	9.38
SeasonCount >= 5	14	123.64	57.36	6.43	0.21	15.64

Other

Group	Player Count	Average Rating	Player of the Match	Minutes Played
SeasonCount = 2	4	6.75	0.00	1665.00
SeasonCount > 2 and < 5	13	6.80	0.69	4299.54
SeasonCount >= 5	14	6.98	1.57	8356.00

Ok, that’s a LOT of different stats. They’re all important in their own way, but it doesn’t break down in a way that tells anything other than “The more seasons you have, the better your average stats will be” which is kind of obvious given how TPE works.

Instead, I want to look at the groupings to see the players that I think are excelling in their grouping and point out why. To do this, I need a view of players that appropriate color codes their stats against the grouping average.

That looks something like this:


2nd Season Players
A handful of players here are available who have played 2 seasons.

The one who jumps out?
Sergio Raskel, Class of S24, who plays for Cairo City.

Interesting data that makes Sergio shine.

Headers

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Headers	Successful Headers	Header %
Sergio Raskel	S24	CDM	45.00	24.00	53.33%

Sergio has the second highest header % of the group (behind by 5 percentage points), but beats the average by a full 15%.

Passing

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Passes	Successful Passes	Pass %	Key Passes	Open Play Key Passes	Progressive Passes
Sergio Raskel	S24	CDM	411.00	370.00	90.02%	15.00	15.00	28.00

Sergio has the highest pass % of the entire group, and beats the average by almost 3%.


Tackling

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Tackles	Tackle %	Tackles Won	Key Tackles
Sergio Raskel	S24	CDM	25.00	92.00%	23.00	2.00

A 92% tackle % is good for 2nd in the group, but a full 13% over the average.

Defense

Name	Player Class	Position	Blocks	Clearances	Interceptions	Mistakes Leading to Goals
Sergio Raskel	S24	CDM	4.00	11.00	27.00	1.00

3rd in blocks, 2nd in clearances, and 2nd in interceptions. All impressive.


Other

Name	Player Class	Position	Average Rating	Player of the Match	Minutes Played
Sergio Raskel	S24	CDM	6.93	0.00	900.00

The biggest item here is the average rating of 6.93, which is the second highest in this grouping.

Overall, an impressive collection of stats for Sergio, who is consistently strong across all the big categories.

3rd and 4th Season Players
Moving on to players in their 3rd and 4th seasons, I have the largest selection, 16 in total.

The standout:
Chicken McTendie, class of S21, who plays for Liffeyside Celtic FC (originally AS Paris in Minors).

Now, McTendie is actually in his 5th season, but his season in Minors was as a Goalkeeper, so the stats returned are only for the seasons he played CDM.

Headers

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Headers	Successful Headers	Header %
Chicken McTendie	S21	CDM	559.00	339.00	68.18%

McTendie had the second highest header % of the group, missing out on first place by 0.35%, and beating the average by a full 24%.

Passing

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Passes	Successful Passes	Pass %	Key Passes	Open Play Key Passes	Progressive Passes
Chicken McTendie	S21	CDM	3747.00	3417.00	91.31%	14.00	14.00	207.00

McTendie had the highest pass %, beating second place by 1%, and beating the average by 4%.

Pressing

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Presses	Successful Presses	Press %
Chicken McTendie	S21	CDM	192.00	71.00	41.71%

McTendie had the highest pressing %, beating second place by 2%, and beating the average by 9%.


Tackling

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Tackles	Tackle %	Tackles Won	Key Tackles
Chicken McTendie	S21	CDM	135.00	77.49%	99.00	36.00

McTendie was actually 6th in tackle %, but still beat the average by 4% which was a strong showing.

Defense

Name	Player Class	Position	Blocks	Clearances	Interceptions	Mistakes Leading to Goals
Chicken McTendie	S21	CDM	68.00	126.00	148.00	6.00

McTendie had the highest number of blocks, 3rd most clearances, and highest number of interceptions.


Other

Name	Player Class	Position	Average Rating	Player of the Match	Minutes Played
Chicken McTendie	S21	CDM	7.01	0.00	5700.00

McTendie had a 7.01 average rating, good for a tie for second in the group.

Really impressive stats from McTendie, who lead their grouping in most everything I’d personally consider important to defensive stats.

5+ Season Players
Only 9 players show up in this list (again, remember it’s primary position of CDM). Really hard to pick a winner here as there were some who had strengths in one stat but weaknesses in another that made it harder to pick.

In the end, I went with:
Caspian Skovgaard, class of S18, who plays for Hollywood FC (and F.C. Kaapstad in the Minors).

Headers

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Headers	Successful Headers	Header %
Caspian Skovgaard	S18	CDM	544.00	362.00	64.61%

Caspain has the highest header 5, a massive 11% higher than 2nd place, and a full 20% higher that the average for the group. Insane!

Pressing

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Presses	Successful Presses	Press %
Caspian Skovgaard	S18	CDM	990.00	363.00	38.52%

Caspian was first place in press %, 3% higher than second place, and 6% higher than the average.

Tackling

Name	Player Class	Position	Attempted Tackles	Tackle %	Tackles Won	Key Tackles
Caspian Skovgaard	S18	CDM	345.00	76.64%	264.00	27.00

Caspian took second in tackle %, but only missed first by 0.1%. They were still 5% higher than the group average.

Defense

Name	Player Class	Position	Blocks	Clearances	Interceptions	Mistakes Leading to Goals
Caspian Skovgaard	S18	CDM	73.00	146.00	265.00	5.00

Caspian beat the average in blocks, was 3rd in clearances, and was second in interceptions.


Other

Name	Player Class	Position	Average Rating	Player of the Match	Minutes Played
Caspian Skovgaard	S18	CDM	7.08	1.00	10921.00

Capsian takes 1st place in average rating, barely squeezing past the second place finisher by 0.01

Overall, strong showing, but really hard grouping to pick a winner.


3 groups, 3 players that I hope to follow in their footsteps. Thanks for reading through my stat digging, this ended up being a lot more data than I expected to pull down. Here’s to seeing my own name showing up in these tables soon!

[McLumberjack]

Inject this shit into my veins