At the midway point of the Premier League season it is not only the league table that has an unusual look about it. The top scorers’ chart after 19 games sees Everton’s Romelu Lukaku and Jamie Vardy of Leicester leading the way on 15 goals each, closely pursued by Odion Ighalo of Watford. Of the strikers who finished in the top five behind last season’s top scorer, Sergio Agüero, only Tottenham’s Harry Kane features in the current quintet after the decline of Chelsea’s Diego Costa, among others, and the emergence of several new faces. Here is ranking of the 10 best striker in the league this season, based on stats provided by Opta. 1 Romelu Lukaku, Everton The £28m Everton paid to sign the Belgium international from Chelsea raised a few eyebrows on Merseyside at the time but it now looks a very shrewd investment. As well as being joint-top scorer with 15 goals Lukaku has laid on four assists and created a total of 27 chances for his team-mates, forming a burgeoning partnership with Gerard Deulofeu. His mobility and first touch have both improved hugely since arriving at Goodison Park, while the natural finishing ability that saw him end as top scorer in the Belgium league aged 17 has been sharpened to devastating effect. Ed Aarons Goals 15 Minutes per goal 111.6 Shot conversion rate 29.4% Assists 4
2 Jamie Vardy, Leicester His spectacular run of scoring in 11 successive Premier League matches will live long in the memory for all Leicester fans but it still may not be enough for Vardy’s hopes of establishing himself as a regular for England. Roy Hodgson has so far proved reluctant to trust the league’s joint-top scorer with a central role and his miss against Manchester City on Tuesday will not have helped his cause. Yet for a player who has worked his way up from Stocksbridge Park Steels in the Northern Premier League to the very highest level, there is no reason to suggest he cannot continue to confound expectations. EA Goals 15 Minutes per goal 110.9 Shot conversion rate 28.8% Assists 3
3 Odion Ighalo, Watford At the back end of last season Ighalo was not even a guaranteed starter for Watford in the Championship, which makes his blistering start to life in the Premier League all the more remarkable. Nobody has managed more shots than Ighalo this season but a big reason for his success and 14 goals has been his partnership with Troy Deeney in an era when strike duos are thoroughly unfashionable. Deeney, previously very much a centre-forward, has adapted to almost a supporting role, providing the bullets for Ighalo to fire Watford to their current lofty position. Nick Miller Goals 14 Minutes per goal 113.6 Shot conversion rate 25.9% Assists 2
4 Harry Kane, Tottenham After his spectacular breakout season some may have doubted whether Kane could follow that up. After a slow start in which he failed to score until the end of September, the 22-year-old has emphatically answered the sceptics with 11 goals in his last 13 Premier League games and has once more been the focal point of a resurgent Tottenham side who go into 2016 fourth in the table. Three more goals in the Euro 2016 qualifiers have also put Kane at the front of the queue to lead the line for England in the summer, especially in light of Wayne Rooney’s recent travails. EA Goals 11 Minutes per goal 151.6 Shot conversion rate 22% Assists 1
5 Olivier Giroud, Arsenal Questions about whether Giroud is quite good enough for a title-challenging team will probably dog him for the rest of his career but presumably they will not bother him at the moment. has 10 league goals in 13 starts to help the Gunners to the top of the table, with another five in the Champions League, two coming against Bayern Munich. What is perhaps even more impressive is that he has improved his all-round play too, his movement and link-ups with Mesut Özil a key reason for Arsenal’s position as title favourites. If he carries on like this, maybe they will finally deliver on their promise. NM Goals 10 Minutes per goal 122.8 Shot conversion rate 23.3% Assists 1
6 Troy Deeney, Watford The scorer of more than 20 goals in each of the last three seasons in the Championship, Deeney took 10 games to get off the mark in the Premier League but he showed there is plenty more to his game as creator-in-chief for his strike partner, Odion Ighalo. Five assists and six goals since breaking his duck against Stoke in October place the 27-year-old fifth in the total goal involvement charts, while he has also laid on 27 chances for his team-mates – the second highest. Watford have turned down several £10m plus offers for Deeney in the last two transfer windows and no doubt there will be plenty of suitors circling again. EA Goals 6 Minutes per goal 283.6 Shot conversion rate 21.4% Assists 5
7 Marko Arnautovic, Stoke There have been few more head-turning, eyebrow-raising developments in the Premier League in recent years than Stoke adopting a fluid and exciting front three and, alongside Bojan Krkic and Xherdan Shaqiri, Arnautovic has more than played his part in their success. The Austrian has been a driving, creative presence from a wide-left position, with six of the seven goals he has scored this season coming against Tottenham, Chelsea, Manchester City, Manchester United and Everton. Having frustrated since his arrival from Werder Bremen in 2013, Arnautovic is now well and truly Stoke’s man for the biggest occasions. Sachin Nakrani Goals 7 Minutes per goal 209.4 Shot conversion rate 23.3% Assists 3
8 Callum Wilson, Bournemouth Had it not been for the knee injury he suffered in September against Stoke, Wilson would probably have been a strong contender for a place in the England squad at Euro 2016 such was his impact in the early weeks of the season. Five goals in just seven starts means the former Coventry striker remains the most prolific marksman in the Premier League in terms of minutes per goal, while his shot conversion rate of 62.5% is freakishly high when compared with the rest. The 23-year-old is hoping to play again before the end of the season although it remains to be seen what effect the injury has had on his blistering pace. EA Goals 5 Minutes per goal 108.6 Shot conversion rate 62.5% Assists 0
9 Sergio Agüero, Manchester City The consensus is that Manchester City’s relative struggles this season have been down to Vincent Kompany’s injury woes but Agüero’s campaign has been equally disrupted. Irritating ailments have limited him to just eight Premier League starts so far, but he has still managed seven goals, five of which came against Newcastle in October. Perhaps the biggest impact of his injuries has not been the games he has missed (City have actually won more games without him than with him) but that he subsequently has looked a little off the pace when he has played. Keeping him fit and sharp will be crucial for City’s title chances. NM Goals 7 Minutes per goal 115 Shot conversion rate 21.9% Assists 1
10 Christian Benteke, Liverpool It says much about Benteke’s finishing capabilities that in a season where he has struggled to fit in at a new club and been hampered by injury, the Belgian has still scored six times in 16 appearances. Three of those have also been winners and one can only wonder how effective the 25-year-old could be for Liverpool were their manager, Jürgen Klopp, able to find a way of properly utilising the player in his side. That may well come in the new year, as could Benteke finally scoring when given a clear run on goal. SN Goals 6 Minutes per goal 175 Shot conversion rate 16.2% Assists 1
No comments:
Post a Comment