The attacking influence of Liverpool’s Philippe Coutinho
By
Rich Taylor
Dec-18-2013
Philippe Coutinho was much lauded by Liverpool fans as their saviour before the start of this season, especially with the prospect of Luis Suarez missing the opening 6 games, or even worse; joining rivals Arsenal. His popularity among the Anfield faithful is reflected by the fact that more Number 10 shirts have been sold than any other for Liverpool this year, and based on last season’s performances, it’s easy to see why. He was a revelation after arriving from Inter Milan last January and was a massive part of Liverpool’s transformation last season, scoring 3 goals and providing 5 assists in just 12 games in the run in which saw Liverpool amass more Premier League points than anyone except current league leaders Arsenal in the second half of last season. Coutinho has been employed wide-left and in the hole behind the striker as part of a 4-3-3 which Brendan Rodgers tends to favour and is probably best known for his killer through balls in the final third.
So how has the 21-year-old Brazilian performed this season? Although we are coming up to the half-way point of the Premier League season, Coutinho has only played 830 minutes this season after a shoulder injury picked up against Swansea in mid-September kept him out for approximately 6 weeks, but that is a fair sample size to judge how he is coping in his first full season in the Premier League.
Shown above is a table of the top 15 players in the Premier League (those who have played 800 minutes or more) in terms of passing stats in a comparison with Coutinho. A casual look at the main passing stats would suggest that Coutinho has had a slow start and failed to reach the heights he set himself last year. From the selected players in the above table, he is lowest in terms of Final 3rd pass completion (60th overall in Premier League), lowest in pass completion (106th overall) and is amongst the lowest in completed passes per 90 minutes. However there may be an alternative analysis to be made, and an alternative conclusion to be reached other than “Coutinho is a bad passer”.
As mentioned earlier, Coutinho really made a name for himself last season with his killer through balls, threading the eye of the needle, and if we look at the statistics for through balls, we can see he is in good company this season.
Aaron Ramsey, Jack Wilshere, Steven Gerrard and (perhaps surprisingly) Olivier Giroud, are the only players other than Coutinho who have managed to reach 5 successful through balls this season, but it is the attempted through balls that I believe is most relevant, and perhaps a contributing factor for his poor passing percentage in the opponent’s third. Coutinho has attempted 26 through balls this season, 6 more than Ramsey despite playing 510 fewer minutes, giving him a rate of 2.82 attempted through balls attempted per 90 minutes, more than twice as many attempts per game than anybody else, with the exception of Jack Wilshere. Obviously attempting through balls all the time is going to result in a much lower passing percentage than someone who is going to look for the easy sideways or backwards pass every time in order to play it safe and retain possession.
Even with all those through balls, is Coutinho contributing enough? Looking at the goals and assists so far this season, you may be forgiven for thinking that 1 goal (which was little more than a tap in from a corner) and 1 assist (which came from a Coutinho corner) would suggest that he is underperforming, and there is no doubt that Coutinho will be disappointed with that return, but the table below suggests differently:
Despite the fairly meagre return from goals and assists, Coutinho has actually created 6 “Big Chances” (passes which lead to a clear-cut scoring opportunity) this season, a feat only bettered by Luis Suarez and Aaron Ramsey, unarguably the two best players in the Premier League so far, along with Sergio Aguero. Coutinho is again rivalling the elite in the league despite significantly reduced playing time, borne out by the highest number of clear-cut chances created per 90 minutes in the Premier League, again with a significant lead over most players. The fact that he only has one assist, whereas players like Ozil and Rooney have more assists, despite creating fewer big chances, may be a statistical blip due to the reasonably small sample size, or could speak to the profligacy of Liverpool (or the efficiency of Arsenal/Manchester United) in front of goal.
It would seem Coutinho has been given a clear objective by his boss to always be on the lookout for the killer ball, and attempt to play it often, giving him license to slide down the pass completion charts, especially in the final third. Brendan Rodgers won’t mind that too much though – his Liverpool team win the ball in the opponent’s third more than any other team in the Premier League – and if Coutinho can keep feeding through balls at his current rate for Luis Suarez and Daniel Sturridge, Liverpool can expect to see him climbing the assists charts soon.
