Luongo carries his weight, certain other players keep pushing down on his shoulders

[nasser95]

Massimo Luongo is right now the only player at this club who has been consistently high level. This kid would probably right now be recognised as the best player in this division if the rest of the team could perform at their usual level.

[Southport]

Congrats on your own section!
If you break out players up into goalkeeper, defender, midfielder and striker how have the different sections been doing? Suddenly the season is looking disappointing, we have scored goals but not from open play. Our defence is susceptible. Rather than looking at individual players can you say if it is one combined section that has underperformed?

[nasser95]

Congrats on your own section!
If you break out players up into goalkeeper, defender, midfielder and striker how have the different sections been doing? Suddenly the season is looking disappointing, we have scored goals but not from open play. Our defence is susceptible. Rather than looking at individual players can you say if it is one combined section that has underperformed?

Cheers mate, So I'm going to put a statistical breakdown of the average performance of all players in a certain position. So the average whoscored rating of our centre backs this season for example, etc...

GK - 1 player: 6.23

Defence - 5 players: 6.985

Full Backs - 3 players: 6.974
Centre Backs - 3 players: 6.950

Midfielders - 9 players: 6.663

Holding Midfielders - 3 players: 6.763

Offensive Midfielders - 7 players: 6.590

Wingers - 6 players: 6.431

Central Attacking Midfielder - 1 player: 6.850

Striker - 2 players: 6.695

So there's your breakdown of all our starters. Our overall team average is 6.748, which means the players letting the team down are overall: our strikers, wingers and goalkeeper. Looking deeper into these 3 areas, the only player who's above the average of the 9 players who've played either striker, winger or goalkeeper is Polter, who has a match average of 6.97.

Overall in the club, only 6 of the 16 players have performed above the club average: 1) Luongo; 2) Onuoha; 3) Caulker; 4) Polter; 5) Bidwell; 6) Chery

The players who have performed overall significantly below average are, from worst up: 1) Washington; 2) Smithies; 3) Gladwin; 4) Ngbakoto; 5) Karl Henry

Note that these are only ratings from their starts. Sub appearances don't count to this rating since it will skew the overalls downwards.

Luongo is the best player at the club all round, combining talent, effort, defensive qualities, offensive qualities. Only Caulker, Perch and Polter have won more aerial duels than him. No one has made anywhere near as many tackles as he has (he's got 5 per game, next up below him are Onuoha and Cousins with 2. No one blocks as many passes as him, only Nasser has made more successful dribbles than he has and no player ahead of the defensive line attempts as many passes as he does.

People who think he's lightweight need to really look again, he's strong in the tackle, confident on the ball and good in the air. This kid is a special talent in the role we have him in. If the rest of the squad can get to that level, we can walk this division. They won't though, because he's a cut above everyone else, and that's not to say they're bad players. He's just the best we've got.

[Southport]

I wasn't expecting that our GK would have the worst rating. Is it possible to compare the QPR keeper against the other keepers in the championship to see if keepers routinely get weaker ratings? I didn't think this would be our weakest area!

With our midfield you imply that Chery and Luongo are two of the names who should be on the teamsheet. Is it possible to look at the games they have both started together at QPR, look at the other midfielders who started those games and give the average ratings for the midfield to those players and see who the statistics suggest play best with these? For example lets say players A and B started with Chery and Luongo. In that game the midfield averaged 7.05, then both players A and B would receive that score. Then average up the other players scores and see who works well with these. (If this is difficult to get then please ignore this. I am just wondering what the stats suggest our best midfield should be, and of course this isnt necessarily our players with the highest individual ratings)

[nasser95]

I wasn't expecting that our GK would have the worst rating. Is it possible to compare the QPR keeper against the other keepers in the championship to see if keepers routinely get weaker ratings? I didn't think this would be our weakest area!

With our midfield you imply that Chery and Luongo are two of the names who should be on the teamsheet. Is it possible to look at the games they have both started together at QPR, look at the other midfielders who started those games and give the average ratings for the midfield to those players and see who the statistics suggest play best with these? For example lets say players A and B started with Chery and Luongo. In that game the midfield averaged 7.05, then both players A and B would receive that score. Then average up the other players scores and see who works well with these. (If this is difficult to get then please ignore this. I am just wondering what the stats suggest our best midfield should be, and of course this isnt necessarily our players with the highest individual ratings)

I'm loving this mate, so there's no problem with me doing this stuff, it should be simple.

Smithies this season is the second lowest rated goalkeeper of the 22 who have played more than 5 matches. Below him is only the Bristol Keeper. He's honestly not been excellent and the last few games have really let him down, with his last 3 ratings being a 6.24, 5.89 and 5.65. Pretty awful. However, take into account the fact that he was rated the number one goalkeeper in the whole championship last season, ahead of Heaton and Konstantopoulos. Hopefully he'll improve soon.

With the second suggestion, I love looking at this stuff. Right now, it's a bit skewed given that Ariel hasn't started yet, nor has Wszolek. Also the fact that Henry has played every game hasn't helped. But nevertheless, we can do something similar and see how Henry's performance changes when he's playing with Luongo compared to when he's playing with Cousins.

In the 6 matches Luongo has played with Chery, Henry has been his only midfield partner. Henry's rating has been 7.2, 7.2, 7.3, 6.3, 5.4, 6.6 and 6.0. If you average that with respect to his minutes in those matches, his average rating is 6.59.

In the two matches Henry has played alongside Cousins, his rating has been 5.9 and 6.7 and since he played the full matches in both cases, his average rating is 6.3. Cousins' average in those matches was 6.46.

One thing I noticed is that Henry's rating fluctuates a lot more in line with the result of the team. Luongo tends to actually perform well irrespective of the result. That could be looked at one of two ways. 1) The team is reliant on Henry's performance. 2) Henry looks better if the team around him plays better. I'm more inclined to believe the second is true...

Now, lets look at the rest of the midfield, take Luongo's score out of the equation each time:

vs Leeds - Henry: 7.2; Shodipo: 6.4; Chery: 7.8; Gladwin: 6.4. Weighted average with time: 7.05
vs Cardiff - Henry: 7.2; Gladwin: 6.2; Chery: 6.7; Cousins: 6.6. Weighted average with time: 6.78
vs Barnsley - Henry: 6.3; Ngbakoto: 7.0; Chery: 7.3; Cousins: 6.4. Weighted average with time: 6.75
vs Preston - Henry: 5.4; Ngbakoto: 6.2; Chery: 6.3; Cousins: 6.1. Weighted average with time: 6.06
vs Wigan - Henry: 6.6; Ngbakoto: 6.7; Chery: 6.4; Cousins: 7.1. Weighted average with time: 6.71
vs Huddersfield - Henry: 6.0; Shodipo: 6.3; Chery: 6.8; Cousins: 6.1. Weighted average with time: 6.34

Those are all of Luongo's starts and you can see that it's pretty variable. One thing I can say is that in each match, Luongo had a higher match rating than that average.

Now we can do the same for Cousins at CM and see what the rest of the midfield did each time. His match ratings were 6.9 and 6.02 respectively.

vs Blackburn - Henry: 6.7; Khayati: 6.6; Chery: 7.5; Shodipo: 6.7. Weighted average with time: 6.88
vs Newcastle - Henry: 5.9; Ngbakoto: 5.7; Perch: 5.9; Chery: 6.0. Weighted average with time: 5.89

Both times you'll see that Cousins wasn't far off the performance of the rest of the midfield but was better overall each time.

The most obvious thing is that Luongo and Cousins should be ahead of Henry under any circumstance. But the results of this analysis are a bit invalid given that we haven't seen Ariel get a start.

Another thing I know for sure is that the middle three should be Cousins, Luongo and Chery, purely from those who have played. We will have to start Ariel and I think the cup match against Sunderland will be the perfect game for him. We can see his tackling, his awareness and his teamwork with whomever is alongside him.

We also can see that Yeni has played significantly better with Luongo in the middle than without him. Certainly there is a player there, but he needs the players around him to work with him. He had a very good start, strong cup performance against Swindon followed by a great outing against Barnsley including a good penalty win. Since then he's been a bit inconsistent.

[Southport]

I'm a big fan of Sandro. If we look at his performances with Chery and Luongo last season how did they perform as a combination?

[nasser95]

Quite interestingly, they have only one match together and it's difficult to truly rate them as a trio because Chery played wide left and Luongo played CAM. Sandro had Tozser next to him and phillips was on the right.

Sandro had a 7.9 rating, Luongo 7.1 and Chery 6.4 in a match at home against Sheffield Wednesday which ended 0 - 0 in October.

[Southport]

I think Sandro should be the first name on the teamsheet so it is a little disappointing that there isnt move evidence to support his inclusion on this basis. I can hope that the cup game gives a second instance of them on the pitch, but probably shouldn't hold my breath!

[nasser95]

I think Sandro should be the first name on the teamsheet so it is a little disappointing that there isnt move evidence to support his inclusion on this basis. I can hope that the cup game gives a second instance of them on the pitch, but probably shouldn't hold my breath!

I personally don't think he should be but that's not down to his ability so much as I think other players who are similar in style to him have done nothing to deserve falling behind someone who doesn't want to be here, Ariel being my main example.

[nanocopic]

Quite interestingly, they have only one match together and it's difficult to truly rate them as a trio because Chery played wide left and Luongo played CAM. Sandro had Tozser next to him and phillips was on the right.

Sandro had a 7.9 rating, Luongo 7.1 and Chery 6.4 in a match at home against Sheffield Wednesday which ended 0 - 0 in October.

That was the match Clint Hill should have been red carded after being last man. And the guy dislocated his shoulder. That game was dire and we were lucky to draw.

[jmelanie]

I personally don't think he should be but that's not down to his ability so much as I think other players who are similar in style to him have done nothing to deserve falling behind someone who doesn't want to be here, Ariel being my main example.

So are you saying other players who are similar in style to him are better players.

[nasser95]

That was the match Clint Hill should have been red carded after being last man. And the guy dislocated his shoulder. That game was dire and we were lucky to draw.

There was a huge thread on here where I defended Clint 100%. Can't remember where it is but that was one of the best tackles I've seen in football. What caught the player was him deciding he wanted to jump high and got caught in Clint's hand as he did. Poor guy, but not a bad tackle at all.

[nasser95]

So are you saying other players who are similar in style to him are better players.

I'm saying that because of their attitude towards the club, they are by nature above him in the pecking order... Ariel being the main one.

[jmelanie]

I'm saying that because of their attitude towards the club, they are by nature above him in the pecking order... Ariel being the main one.

That doesn't answer my question. Do your statistics show that the other players are better players, as in my opinion the best player should be playing. Sandro has indicated that he would like to be playing elsewhere, but this hasn't shown when he has played. We don't really know about the other players. The way we are playing at the moment they might all prefer to be playing elsewhere.

[nasser95]

That doesn't answer my question. Do your statistics show that the other players are better players, as in my opinion the best player should be playing. Sandro has indicated that he would like to be playing elsewhere, but this hasn't shown when he has played. We don't really know about the other players. The way we are playing at the moment they might all prefer to be playing elsewhere.

The statistics don't show anything, as Sandro hasn't played league football so far. What we have to go by is what Jimmy sees in training, the few minutes Borysiuk has played in the league and that's about it. He's only played 52 minutes in a defensive role so hasn't had much to do. Hence why I can't judge anything just yet. What I do know is that Sandro is certainly a good player with a good defensive style but his passing is very very disappointing and in fact, he was the worst passing midfielder in the premier league the year we came down. Despite that, his defensive work is fantastic, but I'd still put Borysuik ahead of him for a start as he's done more to validate selection. That's personal, I don't think you're wrong for wanting him to play, and I wouldn't be surprised if he did play and he played well. I just don't think it's smart pissing off Ariel by playing the player he was supposed to replace ahead of him.