Statistical Analysis: Premier League Player of the Season candidates - Who should win?

Six players go to the PFA Awards 2015 on Sunday night hoping to land the Players’ Player of the Year gong. According to WhoScored rating, the top 6 Premier League players to make at least 25 appearances this season have been Eden Hazard (8.07), Alexis Sanchez (7.91), Cesc Fabregas (7.69), Santi Cazorla (7.64), Sergio Aguero (7.59) and Morgan Schneiderlin (7.52), with Diego Costa (7.53) missing out with just 1 appearance too few (24).

Each has had a significant impact for their respective teams this season, and this could feasibly be the official top 6, but only 2 are actually on the PFA’s nominee list. Here we take a look at the stats for the 6 candidates, in Hazard, Sanchez, Costa, Harry Kane, Philippe Coutinho and David De Gea, to assess the justification for each one being handed the award.

Eden Hazard

The standout candidate for this season’s award, the diminutive winger has shone in a Chelsea team that has barely given anyone else a sniff of the title all season. He did not have the best start to the season, back when Fabregas and Costa could not stop combining to score and the Belgian managed only 1 goal and 1 assist in his first 6 appearances, but he did nonetheless maintain impressive ratings, patently still having an effect for the Blues by occupying opponents with his incredible dribbling ability.

He truly kicked on from November onwards, though, embarking on a run of 11 games in which he scored 6 goals and set up another 3, awarded WhoScored man of the match on 5 occasions. Then, in the run-in, while Chelsea have rather underwhelmed in the last month or so, fatigue taking its toll in the squad that has used the fewest players (22) in the Premier League this season, Hazard has taken it upon himself to drag his team towards the title. He has completed the most dribbles (154) and played the most key passes (88) to go with his 13 goals and 8 assists.

Without his 3 goals and 2 assists in Chelsea’s last 4 games, the Blues would be 9 points worse off, having won each of those matches by a single goal as the performances of many of their stars have tailed off somewhat. They will win the title before long, and they have Hazard, the most consistent player over the course of the entire campaign – only twice registering a WhoScored rating lower than 7 all season – to thank. As the only player with an average score over 8, he is the obvious choice to win the prize.

Alexis Sanchez

Alexis carried Arsenal through the winter months in which so many of their players faltered and has proven one of the best Premier League signings in recent years. Without him, Arsenal simply would not be in the position that they currently find themselves.

Only Aguero (26) and Kane (23) have been directly implicated in more Premier League goals this season than the Chilean (14 goals, 8 assists), who has settled in England incredibly well. He ranks second behind Hazard for successful dribbles (102), third for shots (94), seventh for chances created (70) and second for number of times he has won possession in the final third of the pitch (25). Clearly, Sanchez has been a roaring success in London, but it is tough to see him beating Hazard.

Diego Costa

Given that this is an award voted for largely by his opponents and how horrible it must be to come up against Costa, huge credit should be given to the Spaniard for accruing sufficient votes to get into the top 6. Yes, 19 goals in his debut season for a team that will win the league is hugely impressive, but one imagines that he doesn’t make many friends on the pitch and has instead received votes out of sheer respect for the ruthlessness with which he plays.

He has been the best out-and-out centre forward in the Premier League this season, terrorising defences and picking up 5 man of the match awards along the way, whilst scoring with more than 1 in every 4 of his shots (25.3% conversion). However, dips in form that have permeated his debut campaign in England will stand between him and the Player of the Season award.

Harry Kane

What an incredible year it has been for Kane, rising from 1000-1 outsider for the top goalscorer award to second-favourite this week, he is now an England international and arguably Spurs’ most important player. He is the first Tottenham player to reach 30 goals in all competitions since Gary Lineker, despite having to wait until mid-November for his first league start of the season.

His rating in starts alone is 7.65, and for that he certainly deserves huge credit given that he has come almost from the reserves to his current position as the hottest prospect in England. Without his league-high 20 goals, Spurs would be some 22 points worse off; providing such relentless goalscoring in an otherwise rather unremarkable Spurs team has been incredibly impressive.

The question for voters was whether it is more of an achievement to stand out and score in a team that has underachieved – like Kane – or to have done so in a league-winning side – like Hazard. It is likely that it will be between these two players to win the award, and deciding which has done better this season is tough in itself, but the stats alone – signalled by Hazard’s higher Whoscored rating – suggest that the Belgian is a more worthy winner.

Philippe Coutinho

Jamie Carragher recently claimed that John Terry’s decision to vote for Eden Hazard was merely tactical, in order to give himself and his teammates more chance of winning, and it is fairly likely that that was indeed the case. Coutinho has been wonderful to watch at times this season, scoring a couple of wonderful goals on his way to a rating of 7.32. However, a goal tally of 4 to go alongside 4 more assists are hardly the makings of a player of the season considering how attacking a role he plays.

He has attempted the second-most through balls (36) in the Premier League this season and he ranks fourth for dribbles completed (87), but his 8 goals and assists have come from 117 shots and key passes, suggesting he simply hasn’t been effective enough as Liverpool try to replace the supply lost in Luis Suarez’s departure.

David De Gea

United goalkeeper De Gea was lauded for his performance in the 3-0 win over Liverpool at Anfield back in December, and has since been praised persistently for doing a great deal to save United’s season. He has done well behind a shaky and injury-plagued defence that has not helped him at times, but a saves-to-shots ratio of 70.1% is only the seventh-best of first-choice Premier League goalkeepers this season, and certain moments spring to mind when he could well have fared better.

He ranks eighth for saves (82), eighteenth for crosses claimed (24) and twenty-second for crosses punched clear (6) so, statistically at least, there is room for improvement. De Gea’s stock has increased no end this season, and he is now rightly regarded as amongst the best stoppers in the Premier League, but were he to be named Player of the Season, having gained a WhoScored rating of just 6.70, it would certainly be an injustice.

Who do you think should be named Player of the Season?