"El Niño Maravilla": Alexis Sanchez

A man not short of debate this season, nevertheless, Alexis Sánchez has after the win versus Betis been involved in 50% of FC Barcelona’s last 22 goals. The Chilean winger has scored five goals and given six assists in the last eight matches.

Read more: http://www.totalbarca.com/2013/statistics/stat-of-the-day-50/#ixzz2SghvgHaC

deserves another season with us

Its been encouraging for sure... But playing well in meaningless matches doesn't conceal a season of failure.

Even in recent weeks when needed to deliver in the UCL he failed. Thats whats mattered of late.

Stats lie easily too... 4 of those contributions came in 5-0 romp against Mallorca.

Take away the Mallorca match and it's still 50% of the last 4 La Liga matches, which his stats brought 5 points.

At least he's no Pedro.

Directly contributed points La Liga 12-13 (G+A)

1. Messi 38
2. Fabregas 12
3. Villa 9
3. Alexis 9
5. Iniesta 5
5. Alba 5
5. Tello 5
8. Xavi 4
9. Pedro 3

Harmonica wrote:At least he's no Pedro.

At least Pedro brought us to the CL semifinal.

Alexis is playing well(ish) lately, but we need forwards that can make an impact every game. Not only against la Liga scrubs, and sometimes not even that. We know Pedro can do that, because he did for 2 years consistently. So far Alexis hasn't proved it in two years.

If we get good money and good replacements, for me we can sell them both, but it would be foolish to sell Pedro and not Alexis.

That 'directly contributed points' stat is probably the biggest farce I've ever seen. How many points has Victor Valdes contributed?

It takes into account only 2 things, its pretty much useless.

According to this, Tello had a better season than Xavi and Cesc is our 2nd best player.

Why even bother?

That Pedro is gone Free he can't replicate that form.... he was so effective at finding space between the fullback and the centre back and that space isn't there any more as defenders have adapted to him.

He is now a defensive winger and offers close to nothing.

Alexis has been very good for last few months, he has directly been responsible for half of Barca's last 22 goals and is 3rd behind by Messi and Villa with those with significant minutes for goals and assists per 90 mins ahead of Cesc and Iniesta.

I don't think he deserves to be sold if he keeps it up but he probably will be sold and Pedro will continue to offer nothing for seasons to come.

BarcaKizz wrote:That 'directly contributed points' stat is probably the biggest farce I've ever seen. How many points has Victor Valdes contributed?

It takes into account only 2 things, its pretty much useless.

According to this, Tello had a better season than Xavi and Cesc is our 2nd best player.

Why even bother?

Valdes, I think 0, or how many goals and assists does he have? And this must mean he's the worst player?

According this post, you don't really understand stats, at all. Furthermore, where does it it tell who had the better season? I could probably explain it further, but why bother? You're just gonna act like a clown afterwards.

While I agree with Kizz and Free mostly, I will say I dont know Pedro can impact every game.

He could impact them, but I dont know he can again. Right now its looking like that was his best and we might not see that again.

I think it would be hard to make an arguement that Pedro is more likely to improve from here than Alexis.

Overreaction much? Why make it personal?

Sorry for misinterpreting a post of 5 words then a statistic. Of course I understand how stats work, but I gather your argument is that this one shows Alexis is more effective than Pedro and I don't think thats true at all. If thats not your argument, then make one...

You're the one who brought the stat up. Please enlighten us on what you mean then.

Great Leader Sprucenuce wrote:That Pedro is gone Free he can't replicate that form....
He is now a defensive winger and offers close to nothing.

He is 25 years old. Nobody is finished at 25.

Why is he doing it for Spain then?

The Franchise wrote:While I agree with Kizz and Free mostly, I will say I dont know Pedro can impact every game.

I didn't even mention Pedro till now.

I don't think Pedro will improve either tbh, but that doesn't really change my mind about Alexis. Like Free says, if neither is performing, we should sell them.

I know, that was Free. I was just saying I agree with you and Free about Alexis having to play well in all games..though Betis are no chump I should point out.

Even if Malexis is contributting with goals, he was supposed to be a player that could drible and create magic when we signed him, and he hasn't showed that in his recent performances although he now contributes with goals.

El niño pesadilla can drible as much as Pedro or Villa (almost nothing) and much less than Tello or Cuenca. We really don't need him even at his current form he can't do anything our canteranos can't, and they are free and earn less than him.

The Franchise wrote:I know, that was Free. I was just saying I agree with you and Free about Alexis having to play well in all games..though Betis are no chump I should point out.

Actually, defensively they are quite chump, and Malexis was really average except that brilliant header.

Tello was much better even he didn't score or assit for instance.

Btw, 6 turnovers from Alexis vs. Betis, one of them leading to the second Betis goal.

BarcaKizz wrote:Overreaction much? Why make it personal?

Sorry for misinterpreting a post of 5 words then a statistic. Of course I understand how stats work, but I gather your argument is that this one shows Alexis is more effective than Pedro and I don't think thats true at all. If thats not your argument, then make one...

You're the one who brought the stat up. Please enlighten us on what you mean then.

It's tells you players direct contribution, take away that contribution and we will loose that amount of points directly. It tells you players direct impact, or influence in the results. It also points, if a player scores or assists in a romp or "tight" games. What does that mean, well everyone is entitled to his own reasoning after that.

Alexis is more effective than Pedro, he has less shots, more goals, more assists, more dribbles, more key passes, more throughballs, and he seems to get into great scoring positions almost every game. Until now he has had obvious confidence issues, but they seem to have disappeared, the quality was always there to see.

Where as Pedro seems to have lost every quality that he once had, now he's just mindless running robot, seldomly getting into great positions, and when he finally gets into one, he's already lost every bit of concentration and energy running from point a to point b.

Yeah. Well all I'm saying is I think thats a useless stat.

If you take away that contribution someone else might make it, and make a better contribution. If you take away other contributions which this stat doesn't measure then, again, it also affects the points count. There are too many variables.

I think simply goals and assists count is probably more useful.

Not attacking you at all... I just think this stat isn't so useful in saying that a player is 'more effective' or whatever.

And no... I'm not really arguing for either of them. They've both been so toothless.

BarcaKizz wrote:Yeah. Well all I'm saying is I think thats a useless stat.

If you take away that contribution someone else might make it, and make a better contribution. If you take away other contributions which this stat doesn't measure then, again, it also affects the points count. There are too many variables.

I think simply goals and assists count is probably more useful.

Not attacking you at all... I just think this stat isn't so useful in saying that a player is 'more effective' or whatever.

And no... I'm not really arguing for either of them. They've both been so toothless.

But the point isn't what could happen, but what has happened.

According to transfermarkt, Pedro has a market value of 30 milion euros and Malexis of 25 milion.

I would offload them both for that amount, sign Bale and promote Deulofeu.

Problem solved.

We should market them in the PL. If they can spend 15 milion for some scrub like Steven Fletcher, they can buy us Malexis and Pedro fro 25+ each.

OK, still. I think a simple comparison of (goals + assists) / mins is more useful.

Stat still doesn't take into account contributions which lead to winning games. So don't see the point.

You can never really measure how many games Xavi has 'won' for us can you. Simply because he doesn't make final contributions so much.

Anyway, this is a redundant point.

free_cat wrote:According to transfermarkt, Pedro has a market value of 30 milion euros and Malexis of 25 milion.

I would offload them both for that amount, sign Bale and promote Deulofeu.

Problem solved.

Lol. Horrible overestimation... Nobody will pay more than 10-15M for them in my opinion.

We aren't getting Bale dude... give it up haha.

free_cat wrote:

The Franchise wrote:I know, that was Free. I was just saying I agree with you and Free about Alexis having to play well in all games..though Betis are no chump I should point out.

Actually, defensively they are quite chump, and Malexis was really average except that brilliant header.

Tello was much better even he didn't score or assit for instance.

Btw, 6 turnovers from Alexis vs. Betis, one of them leading to the second Betis goal.

Fair point, but clearly they did enough to bother us. Someone had to do something, he was one of them.

That turnover leading to Betis goal, you cant seriously blame him for? I mean, Dani Alves turned the ball over there many many times and it came to nothing..probably because he guy never smashed in a shot from 30m into the top corner..he was trying to play out and got pressed..its a small thing..

The other turnovers, not great, but he clearly wasnt alone in turning the ball over.

Tello was pretty decent, dont think anyone said Alexis was magnificant..rather, he did and has been doing quite well recently and its somewhat encouraging.

BarcaKizz wrote:OK, still. I think a simple comparison of (goals + assists) / mins is more useful.

Stat still doesn't take into account contributions which lead to winning games. So don't see the point.

You can never really measure how many games Xavi has 'won' for us can you. Simply because he doesn't make final contributions so much.

Anyway, this is a redundant point.

But that gets affected by the "romps", as you said it. Points table doesn't.

And the points stat shouldn't be the conclusion of quality through every player, as deeper in own side you go, less statistical effect player will have by default. But it tells you something when attacker is far behind other attackers.

Who do you think was better player in this Liga campaing, Xavi or Fabregas?

What worries me in the Pedro vs Alexis debate is that Pedro has not improved at all over the past 6 months, whereas Alexis has. In any case I wouldn't be surprised if we kept both of them, if we go by what Alexis and Tito have been saying respectively ("I see myself in Barca for the near future" and "We like that he is gaining his confidence and see him as an option" respectively) there's been no indication that he's on the market.

If an offer of 25m+ comes for him, sell, but not otherwise.

Got that impression from Iniesta hugging Sanchez after the last goal, that he's not going at this point. Gotten that impression actually from a lot of places lately.