Statistical Scouting — Rafael Santos Borré

Rafael Santos Borré looks like he could be the next striker to make the jump from Argentina to a top flight European league. I can hear you already, “…but, Caleb, he was already in a top flight European league and it didn’t work out.” Well, we (I) here at this very important blog believe in second chances, and the Colombian’s performances for River Plate make a strong argument that he deserves a second chance. Borré came up with Deportivo Cali in Colombia and then signed for Atlético Madrid. He spent two years out on loan, one season with Deportivo Cali and another season with Villarreal. Following a disappointing year at Villarreal, he was sold to River Plate.

Which brings us to his performance there so far.

He has 6 goals and 2 assists in 997 minutes. His xG+xA is sitting at 1.02 per 90 minutes, so his counting stats are lagging a bit behind his underlying numbers. His xG+xA/90 number is primarily driven by his xG, which leads the Argentinian Super Liga at .84/90 (yep, he was ahead of Lautaro Martinez).

He took 2.6 chances per 90 minutes, which was good for 7th in the league (Lautaro was 1st at 3.7). The real driver of his high xG/90 was his ability to get into great locations to shoot from. He was 6th in the league in xG/shot at .32. His shot quality was significantly better than everyone who was ahead of him in terms of volume, which is how he ended up leading the league in xG/90. That ChanceMap is almost Luka Jovic levels of ideal. Almost everything is central and inside the box; when he floats towards the half-spaces, he’s still shooting from decent angles. He doesn’t stick out as a creator, but he did create 1.7 chances per 90 minutes.

Borré is still just 22. Transfermarkt has his value at just €3,000,000, and at that price it could make sense for an MLS team to try to sign him as Young Designated Player. While selfishly I’d love to see him in MLS so I could see him play regularly, I think it’s much more likely that after a successful season this year he heads back to Europe and into the Colombian national team picture.

Last and probably least, I know all three of you come here for the over-produced YouTube highlight videos, and I try to not to disappoint.

This article was written with the aid of StrataData, which is property of Stratagem Technologies. StrataData powers the StrataBet Sports Trading Platform.