TOP FIVE passing midfielders – Championship

The Passing Midfielders

passingIt is always difficult picking a starting point as to where you should start when considering what makes a passing midfield player. You can set parameters all you like but one man’s parameter is another man’s obstacle. You can set a certain amount of appearances as some form of standardisation, say 20 for argument’s sake, but that is fraught with danger. Why, I hear some cry from the terraces, why is that? Regression, regression to the mean. Big mathematical concept that can be summarised very sharply; a accurate passing midfield player playing 20 games will have a higher passing accuracy (completion %) that another accurate passing midfield player who has played 39 games. This is so simply because more games played, more time on the field, more passes attempted leads to more chances of failed passes cropping up.

I’ll be upfront with what I chose as my main criteria for the follow ‘top 5 midfield passers’: high percentage of time played with a passing accuracy of 80%+. My thinking behind this was simple, If a player plays as much of a season as they possibly can then 80%+ passing shows they have a high level of passing acumen, leading to a higher level of pass completion.

The following are ranked 5 down to 1 in terms of their accuracy of passing, but I will be breaking this down to see what other benefits they bring to their respective teams. Purely ranking them in terms of their passing completion 5 doesn’t really give you a decent snapshot as to their skill as a passing midfielder.

All statistics are derived from the WhoScored.com data set

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