NWSL Defensive Play
An early exploration using the data collection effort from the WoSo Stats team.
I love defense. It is my favorite part of watching women’s football, especially if I am at a game (as you can see from the image above). Thus, you can probably predict my reactions to watching the USWNT at the Olympics. Regardless, I want to explore defense thoroughly and this cannot happen without a complete set of data (please join). For now, here is what I got…
The Delicate Balance Between Ball Defending and Player Defending
There are some players incredibly good at ball defending [interceptions, clearances, and blocks]. There are some players who excel in player defending — tackles and dispossession — or 1 v 1 defending. Then, there are the select few who are phenomenal at both. Let’s explore the delicate balance between the two…
What you have below is a graphic that compares ball and player defending per 90. Player defending is on the x-asis and ball defending is on the y-axis. The median or 50% line is in bold for both and the shaded region gives you an idea of 25 and 75%. Thus, if you lie in the upper right white area, you are not only a balanced player but phenomenal in both aspects. If you are closer to the upper left corner, you excel in ball defending and if you are closer to the lower right corner, you excel in player defending. Take a minute to understand the graphic below completely.
Now this is not perfect — it is not a complete set of data that represents the entire season and therefore, may not reflect how some players transformed. It does tell an early story.
The Raw Data
Now let’s consider only the players better than 50% in both player and ball defending. Here are some raw numbers with a particular focus on ball defending (clearances, blocks, and interceptions). The color scheme is supposed to allow your eye to pick out the best overall ball defenders per 90 minutes.
It is easy to pick out who is the best at each quality: Vanessa DiBernando and Arin Gilliland have a high number of blocks. Ali Krieger and Dani Colaprico are fantastic at interceptions. Julie Johnston, Julie King and Becky Sauerbrunn make a lot of clearances.
Now consider player or 1v1 defending. This includes tackles and dispossession but I also included fouls conceded just out of curiosity. This time, the color scheme is to help you pick out the best overall 1v1 defenders per 90 minutes.
Colaprico, Simon, and Zerboni make the highest number of tackles. Long and Simon have dispossessed the ball more times. Finally, to satisfy my curiosity, Horan, Mautz and Zerboni lead in fouls conceded. Also, if you are interested, the person who was dispossessed most in this particular list is Horan.
Team Based Analysis with an NWSL Playoff Emphasis
From these two lists as well as the original graphic, you also get an idea of which teams had the most balanced players but just to be thorough, consider this summary and particular an emphasis on the playoff teams. Just so you know how to read the data, refer to the illustration on the left. Above the divide is the 50% or better. The box itself describes 25–75%.
We can consider the original graphic with respect to each playoff team. Again, Chicago Red Stars have some impressive defensive players. Shout out to Kleiner for being almost as balanced as Krieger in defense. Menges is in a league of her own for ball defending.
Putting Team Defense in Context For Goalkeepers
I want to mention the overall team defense in terms of player and ball defending. The lighter part of the box represents upper 25% and the darker box represents lower 25%. Thus, you can compare where team’s middle ground compares to overall middle ground. It is fun to look at this and see how some teams have one standout ball defender — FCKC has Sauerbrunn, Orlando with Alleway, and Portland with Menges.
You can take this into consideration when you also consider goalkeepers of the year. Which team had the best defense and fantastic goalkeeper? Which team had the worst defense with goalkeepers keeping the team in the game? With both questions in mind, how do you rank the best goalkeeper?
How do the USWNT players perform defensively in the NWSL?
Now the last thing and probably the biggest thing I am like to rant about is how much NWSL can tell us about the USWNT defense so let’s go back to this delicate balance and just consider the defenders from the Olympic Roster. How do they compare with each other, at least in the NWSL?
However, let’s consider all of the Olympians for USWNT and where they stand but remember only those with 360 minutes or more of recorded data are on display. Thus, anyone who was injured or not part of the league (Pugh) are definitely not included. Remember that those in the upper right quadrant (defined by those bold lines) are better than 50%. You can see the NWSL players in the background, which should give a good idea of who deserves a call from Jill Ellis.
Add your thoughts, observations, and questions below. Make sure to check out WoSo Stats on Twitter, how you can help, the stats database, definitions of these stats, and some visualizations courtesy of WoSo Stats. The visualization presented here are my own and will made public once all matches are logged.
