Settling the debate: Who is the best player at the World Cup?
Posted on July 5th, 2010 in General
With the World Cup coming into the decisive stages, there is lots of debate about who the most influential players are. With everyone offering a different opinion, is there any one definitive way to settle the debate?
A team of researchers at Northwestern University believe they have come up with a solution. They claim the real objective of football is not so much scoring goals, as it is moving the ball away from your own goal, and towards the opposition’s goal – thereby maximising your team’s chances of scoring.
To this end, players that successfully maintain possession for their team maximise their team’s chances of success. To chart this, the researchers examined two important statistics: the amount of passes successfully completed to a teammate, and the amount of shots that result in goals. When these two metrics are taken together, they can show how the relative importance of each individual player’s contribution to the team’s scoring opportunities.
So who do they think the best player at the World Cup is? Click here to read more and find out.
