Edouard's Improvement

Edouard’s recent star introduction for the French Under 21 international side (4 goals in 2 games) has further raised the profile of Celtic’s record signing.

Additionally, even hyper critical pundit Chris Sutton is noticing improvements in the youngster’s game as evidenced in his commentary during the Cluj game.

Time to mine the data.

Goalscoring

The brass tacks for a striker is clearly goals. Edouard is maintaining his goal record from last season with 0.58 goals per 90m compared to 0.55 last season. A modest increase.

However, a more predictive number is xG. This is down from 0.591 to 0.528 per 90m.

And he is taking less shots – from 3.34 to 3.18 this season. He is also on the end of less Big Chances.

That may sound a wee bit dispiriting. So, let’s look at the wider attacking skill set.

Creativity

Assists are up slightly from 0.34 to 0.36 per 90m, and reflected in xA up from 0.261 to 0.316.

He is playing more key passes overall (passes leading to chance) from 1.26 to 2.02.

A hint at the rounding out of the Frenchman’s game is to consider Secondary Assists (the pass before the pass creating the chance). This has risen from 1.02 to 1.3 per 90m but Expected Secondary Assists (xSA) is up from 0.192 to a squad leading 0.288 per 90m.

Supporting this trend is our friend Packing. Pack Passes are actually down a tad, but there is a big leap up in Pack Receives. This would attract the attention of Mr Sutton as it indicates Edouard’s ability to be available for and receive passes that take out opponents. It is a good indicator of movement, appreciation for space, control and awareness. The score denoting Packing is called Impect and for receiving the ball this is up from 49.06 to 63.49 – a 29% increase.

Last Third Actions

Finally, let’s consider some more rounded attacking metrics.

He is taking slightly more touches in the box (up from 5.36 to 5.49). He is also winning (1.65 to 1.95) and losing (8.25 to 9.17) more challenges – indicative of greater overall involvement. Indeed, the fact he is now losing the ball in the final third 8.38 times per 90m compared to 5.67 last further supports this.

Summary

So, where does this leave us with Edouard?

On the face of it, Edouard’s critical goal output is marginally improving and indeed xG is down.

But by considering a wider array of attacking metrics we see a more rounded forward player emerging. He is more open to receive the ball (Pack Receives) and he is linking the play to a far greater degree (Secondary Assists). Even though he is losing the ball to more challenges and more often in the last third, it is all indicative of greater overall involvement.

Next will be to develop greater strength to hold the ball up more often in addition to his obviously improving off the ball movement and awareness of the movement of others.

Edouard is improving nicely as an all-round striker.