How good is Elliott Anderson?
Elliot Anderson vs Man Utd, Game Week 10
I am fascinated by Elliot Anderson’s peformances right now. I recently watched Nottm Forest v Man Utd and he was exceptional. To use what is an old fashioned term these days, he is Forest’s playmaker. He was at the heart of everything they did and he would be the first player on my teamsheet if I was the Forest Manager (I sent my CV to Evangelos Marinakis in case he runs out of choices this season, although he will have to pay big to get me out of my Anorak FC contract).
Lets take a look at some of his stats so far up to and including Game 10. Other criteria are:
Must have played in at least 4 games
Must have played at least 270 mins
Only Premier League stats are included (no Cups or Europe).
Elliot Anderson’s passing and SCA stats
Anderson is way ahead in Passes Attempted (795) and Passes Completed (662). Next best is Liverpool’s Dominik Szoboszlai Passes Attemted (716) and Passes Completed (599). But he is only 41st on the pass completion percentage (83.3%). The best two are Lamare Bogarde (Aston Villa and 94.3% - surprise?) and Curtis Jones (Liverpool and 92%). Only two others have above 90%, Caicedo (Chelsea and 90.8%) Andre (Wolves and 90.7%).
So Anderson needs to lift the pass completion percentage. Watching him against Man Utd he seems to be more inclined to be defensive, but that is not backed by his SCA (Shot Creating Actions) where is 2nd best on 46. This suggests he is very much attack minded as well. Bruno Fernandes is top with 64 SCAs.
But what the question here is, is how damaging those 16.7% failed pass completions have been, have the failed passes resulted in a swing to prolonged opposition possession or shots on the Forest goal? Even it resulted in zero shots handing over possesion 1.6 times in every 10 passes is not going to help with controlling a game. Looking at it closer his overall pass completion percentage is brought down by the 49.5% completion on Long Ball Passes (longer than 30 yards). So one in two long balls from Anderson are failing. Is this more of failing of Forest’s tactics (higher risk tactics) than Anderson himself? I would suggest Sean Dyche’s tactics will require more long balls than Nuno Santo or Ange Postecoglu wanted, so Anderson may need to brush up on his accuracy in this department.
Final Verdict:
Overall Anderson’s stats are impressive because he leads or is in the top handfull in the passing and shot creating actions categories. I believe he is now a key EPL playmaker and will be sought after by the top teams come the next transfer windows, maybe not the January one but certainly the end of season one. Or can Forest hold onto him, as I am sure they will want to? The success of Forest’s season will play an important role in that.
The Sean Dyche quote in the ‘From the Dugout’ below is particularly relevant to Anderson. Ten games in and the Forest ship has certainly been sailing in stormy waters so far… but Anderson seems to be resiliant to that, taking the wheel and delivering on the pitch!
He is a “must” for the England team.
Could he even become comparable with Gerrard, Lampard or Scholes?
All stats for this analysis are provided by FBref
FROM THE DUGOUT
"Anyone can take the wheel of the ship in calm water but it's not so easy when it's not calm water. You can't just enjoy the good times, you have to be resilient in the tough times."
Sean Dyche
The Devil is in the Detail