Statistical Scouting — Luka Jovic
I’m going to attribute this anecdote to John Gasaway, but I’m pretty sure he attributed it to someone else as he was relaying it to the class I was in, so I apologize to whomever initially made this observation. The gist of it is this: when you’re looking at a list of players based on a metric, you want 4 of the first 5 names to confirm what you already believed and 1 to surprise you. I was looking at xG/90 in the Bundesliga last year and got surprised. Three out of the first 4 were exactly whom I expected… Lewandowski, Aubameyang, and Batshuayi. But the 4th name? I’d never seen it before. I checked his minutes played to make sure the sample size wasn’t so small as to be meaningless; it wasn’t. I did a quick google search on “L Jovic, Frankfurt.” Twenty years old. Ok, you have my attention, Mr. Jovic. I watched an over-produced highlight video on youtube because I can’t help myself, and then I went back to staring at a spreadsheet.
Jovic scored 8 goals and had 1 assist in about 930 minutes for Eintracht Frankfurt last year, which is right in line with the 1.02 xG+xA/90 my spreadsheet spit out. He got on the end of 3.5 chances per 90, and the chances were in tremendous locations (.24 xG/shot), almost exclusively inside the 18 yard box and central.
He was second in xG/90 behind only Lewandowski, second in chances taken per 90,third in xG+xA/90 behind Lewa and Aubameyang, and 6th in xG/chance. Those rankings would be pretty impressive for basically any striker on the planet. It’s even more impressive considering this particular striker was a 20-year-old in his first season in a top 4 league.
He spent last year on loan to Eintracht from Benefica in Portugal. I believe Eintracht exercised an option to buy him at €12,000,000, but if he is able to replicate his performances from last season in a larger role, his next transfer will be for considerably more. The only club with reported links to Jovic this summer was Newcastle, and a move to a mid-table Premier League team makes some sense given the buying power of that league; however, his performances to date say he might be ready for a significant role on a larger stage.
This article was written with the aid of StrataData, which is property of Stratagem Technologies. StrataData powers the StrataBet Sports Trading Platform.
