Chris Martin - Some Stats.

[MJP3]

I recently posted similar for Andi Weimann, and foolishly though words along the lines of "May be of Interest to some." would be enough explanation.

So ...

For those interested in stats, it may be worth having a look. For those not, it will waste their time.

Thus, if you just want to rant about Martin being Crap, a Donkey, a Crap Donkey etc., please join/start another thread.

No. - Stats Don't tell you everything.

Yes. - They can be misleading.

No. - They might not be 100% accurate.

Think I've got it covered this time. 

For those still here, I hope you enjoy and find it...er ..interesting.

 

https://eflanalysis.com/analysis/chris-martin-2021-22-bristol-city-stats

 

 

 

[Gazred]

I think we use him as an out and out target man too much. He's much better with the ball into chest or feet with his back to goal.

I'd like to see us play off him at pace a bit rather than lump it and recycle the seconds.

[brady bunch]

A quality Championship player, who is performing well, just way too much on his shoulders and not enough support from elsewhere. NP knew this and admitted it, when he said he waned one more player to "put the ball in the back of the net", i think most assumed that was a Target man to go along side him or Nakki. I am sure the club tried to bring one in, but the market is mad and it was not to be. 

[Davefevs]

The “problem” (define problem!) with Chris Martin is that he’s perceived as a “target man” (define target man!).

I (and others) have described him as a “chest down target man”, and at 5’10”(ish) he is not gonna win tonnes of headers.  But he is strong, holds off his opponent well, and capable of bringing others into play.

However Martin is at his best doing this from within the attacking third, around the area (give and go’s) from well secured possession / territory….not around the halfway line from “punts” clear where a defender can watch the flight and beat him in the air.  We saw early last season him setting up goals for Wells and linking with Semenyo in the cup too when he can isolate his man in / around the box.

Early this season the much maligned Zak Vyner showed an improvement to his game, rather than pinging diags early in the possession phase, he started to get his head-up and look to play into Martin’s feet.  Martin dropping off of his marker, then linking with the midfield in something resembling a pattern of play!

Ultimately we aren’t using Martin in the best way, some of that is because of the overall style of play that Nige has gone for (in some respects forced on him), the other is over-use.

31 minutes ago, Gazred said:

I think we use him as an out and out target man too much. He's much better with the ball into chest or feet with his back to goal.

I'd like to see us play off him at pace a bit rather than lump it and recycle the seconds.

I took a long time to type my reply…..wish I’d read yours whilst creating it.

[underhanded]

Martin excels at what I like to call the 'wall pass' - when you ping one in to a players feet and they flick it 3-4 yards at a variety of angles to a supporting player in close vicinity (see Giroud for someone who does this VERY well).

The problem is, he's too isolated, and the quality of ball into him isn't good enough, for these to be pulled off successfuly.

 

[IAmNick]

Interesting stuff.

On the final graphic, I think it'd be good to normalise it by using minutes played or something. That way we could see (for example) if Williams 14 is actually pretty impressive for the time he was on the pitch. Also interested in the 6 passes he played to himself at a overall negative expected threat!

Second comment is that while I do like pass maps, they look so chaotic to me. I've looked before at using k-means clustering to pick trends of passes, then overlay them on top. Is that something you've thought of? I think it looks decent and the info is much more readable and valuable.

Edited October 27, 2021 by IAmNick

[LondonBristolian]

42 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

The “problem” (define problem!) with Chris Martin is that he’s perceived as a “target man” (define target man!).

I (and others) have described him as a “chest down target man”, and at 5’10”(ish) he is not gonna win tonnes of headers.  But he is strong, holds off his opponent well, and capable of bringing others into play.

However Martin is at his best doing this from within the attacking third, around the area (give and go’s) from well secured possession / territory….not around the halfway line from “punts” clear where a defender can watch the flight and beat him in the air.  We saw early last season him setting up goals for Wells and linking with Semenyo in the cup too when he can isolate his man in / around the box.

Early this season the much maligned Zak Vyner showed an improvement to his game, rather than pinging diags early in the possession phase, he started to get his head-up and look to play into Martin’s feet.  Martin dropping off of his marker, then linking with the midfield in something resembling a pattern of play!

Ultimately we aren’t using Martin in the best way, some of that is because of the overall style of play that Nige has gone for (in some respects forced on him), the other is over-use.

I took a long time to type my reply…..wish I’d read yours whilst creating it.

I agree about the over-use and not using him in the best way. The other thing I'd say is that, as the article suggests, Martin likes to drop deep but that only works if players run on beyond him. Partly through injuries, partly through weaknesses in the squad and partly through the over-use of Weimann, we lack players who will run past him and get in the box.

I'd really like us to get to a point where our 2 "wide" midfielders play a bit narrower and are a bit more willing to operate like forward players. At the same time I think that Semenyo and Weimann (who is better in the centre) are the only two first team players that really suits. It's not the natural game for O'Dowda, Pring, Scott, Williams, Massengo or Palmer. 

[GrahamC]

Martin is a good player & a useful one for us.

The overuse comment above is spot on, the fact that he was taken off v Forest just after the hour was to me the first acknowledgment NP knows this, but so far he hasn’t been willing to start with a Wells/Weimann partnership instead.

The other issue is he’s slow, so we cannot play in a way that leaves him isolated because he isn’t going to beat anyone for pace & needs quicker players around him.

I don’t worry so much about the aerial stuff, as I actually think he does very well in the air against taller opponents.

[Davefevs]

44 minutes ago, IAmNick said:

Interesting stuff.

On the final graphic, I think it'd be good to normalise it by using minutes played or something. That way we could see (for example) if Williams 14 is actually pretty impressive for the time he was on the pitch. Also interested in the 6 passes he played to himself at a overall negative expected threat!

Second comment is that while I do like pass maps, they look so chaotic to me. I've looked before at using k-means clustering to pick trends of passes, then overlay them on top. Is that something you've thought of? I think it looks decent and the info is much more readable and valuable.

Pass maps from Wyscout come in these varieties:

Player (above) showing pass direction / length, successful / unsuccessful / key - but they don’t show who they passed to

Player Heatmap (above) showing where they made passes from, the brighter colour the more passes they made - but they lack things like the arrows in the first example on top of recipient.

Team passing network (above) showing who passes to who, but the blobs are based on their average position they made their passes.  I want to click on two players and see exactly what I see in pic 1.  Would be nice to look at the connection between 26-Vyner and 9-Martin.  I can see they made 7 passes between each other, but I don’t know where on the pitch those passes were made or received.

As you (Nick) will know, you can scrape x,y location data but it requires a bit of work to turn into something usable.

There is an app called Statzone that used to do all of this….cost me £3.99pa for the whole of the Championship or £9.99 for lots of other leagues, but they stopped supporting the Championship last season.

[Davefevs]

As at the last break.

[Mr Popodopolous]

Definitely think we aren't using him all that well, also that we risk overplaying him.

Using him as a target man you hit it long to- not the best for him, not the best for us. IMO anyway.

[Supersonic Robin]

2 hours ago, Gazred said:

I think we use him as an out and out target man too much. He's much better with the ball into chest or feet with his back to goal.

I'd like to see us play off him at pace a bit rather than lump it and recycle the seconds.

Agree with this. Think we had similar issues with Diedhiou to some degree.

There's a big difference between an accurate intentional long ball into a striker, and an uninspired or panicked hoof in the general direction of a striker.