How well do footballers pass to their striker? Part I
Inspired by Mark Carey and his article in The Athletic on the collaboration of left-footed players and left-footed strikers. I conducted my own research on the subject. I used open source data available from StatsBombs repositories and analysed the 2015/2016 Premier League season. The thesis of Mark’s article, and the question it sought to answer, arose when Kevin de Bruyne suffered an injury and was replaced by Phil Foden. Specifically, the question is: Can a left-footed player (Phil Foden) work with a left-footed striker (Erling Haaland) from the same area of the pitch as Erling Haaland works with a right-footed player (Kevin de Bruyne). Of course, we have to take for granted that these three players are world class and it is no coincidence that they play under Pep Guardiola at Manchester City. But we have looked in more detail at the link between left-footed strikers and left- or right-footed players as a more general rule.
Terms and conditions:
- Premier League season 2015/2026 (Stats Bomb open repo)
- assists = passes from a left- and right-footed player that lead to a goal scored by a left-footed player only
- all passes leading to a goal are from: open play (excluded: corner kicks, penalty kicks, throw-ins, free kicks)
- the left and right half spaces of the pitch cover the penalty area.
So let’s get straight to the analysis. As you can see, the graph below shows all assists leading to a goal made by left- or right-footed players. Overall, the number of all goals from a left-footed striker assisted by a left-footed player is 47 and from a right-footed player is 93.
An easy visual analysis shows:
1) The more passes leading to goals come from the collaboration of right-footed players with left-footed striker. This is not unexpected as there are more right-footed players in the Premier League in the 2015/16 season. According to the Fbref website, in the 2015/2016 Premier League season there were: 119 (22%) left-footed players, 407 (74%) right-footed players and 25 (5%) players classified as ambidextrous.
2) The position of the passing player on the pitch differs for right- and left-footed players.
3) There are positions on the pitch that are more often occupied by right- or left-footed players. These last two points affect: passing angles, passing distances and the position on the pitch of both players (midfielder and striker). Thus, the running patterns and position on the pitch for a left-footed striker will be slightly different when the assisting player is right- or left-footed. We will now discuss these two groups in more detail.
It is easy to see from which area of the pitch the most assists come. If we look at each space, we find that for assists players with better left-foot, the most comfortable areas are left, left half and center space. For assist player with better right-footed, the passing area is more varied: left half, middle, right half and right half of the pitch. It also appeared that from the individual spaces passes are delivered to a specific area of the pitch. From the right half of the pitch, more passes provided by right foot player hit the far goal post, and from the left half of the pitch, passes provide by left foot player with the left leg hit the nearer goal post. This can be an indication of the movement of the left footed striker. If the ball came from left half space and he made a diagonal movement towards the nearer goal post, he naturally got the ball on his better foot and if a defender attacks him, he will guide the ball with his foot further away from the opponent. Note that a pass from the left half-space is straightforward when the striker makes a diagonal move. If the ball came from the right half-space, it is natural for him that the ball came to him on the better leg and he can accept the ball or shoot at the first touch. Here we have also the opposite situation, from the right half-space the pass is diagonal and the striker makes a straight run. These two situations (diagonal run — straight pass and straight run — diagonal pass) are key in the Football Association’s ‘Two-player core football moves’ rules. In short, more of these situations allow the player without the ball to increase his maximum speed and shorten the distance he has to cover on the field. Such plays are extremely difficult for defenders:
- because the player without the ball moves to his blind side
- to defend well, the defender must make a turn towards the running player.
Analyses all the information carefully in a more general way:
if you have a left-footed striker
- and a passing player with a better left leg:
- try to position the passing player in the left or left half-space of the field.
2. and a passing player with a better right leg:
- try to position the passing player specifically in the middle, left or right half of the pitch.
Understanding the relationship between the striker’s leading foot, his ability and when/where he runs in relation to position, the leading foot and the clever movement provided by passing players seems to be important.
In my next article I intend to analyse a pair of players (passing angles, strikers runs) with the above scenarios: a left-footed striker and a left- or right-footed passing player.
Finally, I have included a viz with all the options for the left/right footed striker and passing player with better left/right leg.
