Chelsea’s Jorginho should be judged on metrics relevant to his role

Jorginho was shortlisted as one of the best player in Europe, for the Ballon d’Or, along with 29 other players. Chelsea and Manchester City had five players each. These nominations are a testament to how well the players have performed over the past year. The problem is that some players will never have a fair shot at winning the award because players in almost every position are being judged on one criteria: goals and assists.

Yes, goals are the single most important commodity in football and the most important determinants of a match’s outcome. However, they are available to a select few. Some players operate in the area of the pitch where there are several opportunities to score, therefore certain types of players will always have more goals and assists than others. This is even more relevant for a team like the Blues that did not set the world alight on the goal scoring front last season. Assists aren’t even a true measure of attacking prowess, as there are several instances where assists are just a consequence of passing the ball to a very special player. Assists shouldn’t be discredited though, but they also shouldn’t be given as much value as they currently are.

Chelsea’s conductor, Jorginho, should be measured based on metrics relevant to his role as a midfield maestro, rather than goals and assists tallied

There are four categories of players on the pitch: goalkeepers, defenders, midfielders and forwards. These players all have different roles to play because football is a complex sport and there lots of things for coaches and managers to consider when they want to win games. Goalkeepers and defenders try as much as possible to keep the ball out of their own net, the forwards are ultimately tasked with creating and converting goals, the midfielders are tasked with joining the attack and the defense, as well as winning the ball back when out of possession. A team obviously needs to have the ball to be able to attack, though it often doesn’t win the ball back until it’s in the team’s own defensive third. The midfielders are then tasked with getting that ball to the forwards. Midfielders have some defensive and offensive responsibility, but it is important to know where the line is so that midfielders can be evaluated fairly.

Football discourse of the present day seems to lack the nuance involved in discussing midfielders, especially holding and defensive midfielders, as former Manchester United centerback Rio Ferdinand has shown. Jorginho, for example, is a player that has split opinions among pundits and fans. Interestingly, non-English managers and pundits seems to appreciate Jorginho more. Jorginho is a defensive midfielder and he does his best work in possession-based systems, so his role is to win the ball back and recycle possession from deep. Emphasis on the “from deep” part.

According to SofaScore, in the just concluded UEFA Champions League campaign, Jorginho joint-led all players in the competition in tackles (26) and ranked second for interceptions (26). This is shows that the Italian was outstanding in his role as a defensive midfielder in terms of winning the ball back. In addition to this, Jorginho made the most passes for Chelsea, ranking seventh in the tournament. He also recorded the fourth-best passing accuracy for the Blues in the competition. He completed the most long balls for the European Champions with a 67 percent long ball accuracy. Considering the tackling and interceptions numbers, as well as the passing numbers, it’s fair to say Jorginho was outstanding in his role as a deep-lying defensive midfielder. The ranks within his team show just how crucial a role he played en route to the title.

In the recent UEFA Euro 2020 tournament, Jorginho led all players in the competition in interceptions (25), 11 more than the next player. He also ranked third for tackles amongst Italy players. Jorginho made the most passes for Italy (484) at a 93 percent passing accuracy, ranking second for completed passes in the competition. He played the third-most long balls for Italy as well (14) with a 58 percent long ball accuracy. Again, looking at the four key stats for a player playing Jorginho’s role, he was outstanding. He ranked second or first in each of these categories. Jorginho clearly won the ball back very well and recycled possession superbly. Those defensive numbers begin to look outrageous when one sees that he played in a possession-based side.

Evaluating Jorginho on metrics that aren’t relevant for his role would inadvertently paint him in a bad light. Evaluating him on chances created and assists would be unfair because—while he’s supposed to be a deep-lying playmaker—his role is to control the tempo, recycle possession and win the ball back. He did create chances though, in fact he created the sixth most chances for Italy in the Euros (7) and the only players that created more than he did for Chelsea were all forwards.

Football discourse needs to be nuanced in such a way that it is fair to players who never get a chance to score. Players have roles, the job of goals and assists are the roles of a specific category of players. Evaluating a defensive midfielder on goals and assists is just wrong and doesn’t show appreciation for a player’s actual contributions relative to their role on the pitch. This is not to say that there cannot be players that have traits of another category of players as part of their game.

It would be fair for forwards to be judged on purely goals and assists, as they operate primarily in the final third. Attacking midfielders and wingers would then need to be judged on something more relevant to their role like chances created, big chances created and shot creating actions. Central midfielders can be judged on dribbles, passes, long balls and losses of possession, chances created can also be factored into that depending on how high they play up the pitch. Defensive midfielders have more defensive duties, so it would be fair to judge them on tackles, interceptions, passes, long balls and long ball accuracy. Defenders can be judged on tackles, interceptions, blocked shots, clearances and clean sheets. Goalkeepers can show how high they’re performing by their save percentage, shots saved relative to quality of shots, clean sheets and high claims.

Every player cannot be held to the “goals and assists” standard because then some players look extremely good and others look awful. It would be silly for an award to come down to a choice between a forward and a defender then the forward is picked because he has more goal contributions or for the defender to be picked because he has more defensive actions. Unfortunately, something similar is happening with the award currently. Goalkeepers rarely ever get given best player awards, even when they play gargantuan roles in their team’s achievements. This is the same with centerbacks and defensive midfielders. Midfielders enter the conversation for these awards if they perform more like a forward should. It’s not right and it has to stop.

Stats are evaluated based on players who have had up to six Champions League appearances or three European Championship appearances.