His career numbers per whoscored.com don't fully support this interpretation. He has averaged 1.6 dribbles per 90 minutes during his career. The only league season in which he average more than 2 dribbles per 90 was his last at Werder Bremen when he averaged 2.4 per 90. He averaged about 1.4 dribbles per 90 during his time in La Liga. Last season he was down half a dribble per 90 from his career average. However one thing that jumps out is that he appears to have become more selective when he dribbles. At Werder Bremen and Real Madrid and in his first league season at Arsenal he consistently completed about 50% of his dribbles. During the last four years he has completed almost 65% of his dribbles, so he is dribbling less but doing it more efficiently. This could be on instruction from Wenger. These numbers reflect full league seasons only.
I'm not sure where this Luiz as a midfielder thing is coming from. “1.6 dribbles per 90 minutes.” What does that even mean? It’s so funny hearing people talk soccer in these ways... I don’t have any stats, but I’ve seen him beat people and get himself out of close spaces many times. In the WC, the one he won, he killed people on the flank with the ball at his feet.
There is nothing wrong with tracking anything, but I still have no clue what “1.6 dribbles per 90 minutes” means or how his percentage of “dribbles per 90” increasing or decreasing from season to season correlates to his ability to beat people in transitions and/or in open space. But, it’s not really important. Neither of us thinks that he can do it now when it counts.
Dribbles is whoscored's code for beating a player 1 v 1. He still gets out of tight spaces, but doesn't necessarily progress the ball downfield, so who scored doesn't count those as dribbles. But back to my original point, he has always been a pass first player and has the vision to move the ball quickly.
Ozil did used to push the ball out of his feet past players before but doesn’t do it now It wasn’t like one on one dribbling but in tight spaces etc especially in wide areas so I don’t know if it’s classed as a dribble or passing a player as such Either way, his foot speed has reduced which is the point
He is tall, reasonable at defending and an excellent passer He’s been shown up as a cb Multiple times
Also, hasn't a lot of Luiz's success as a CB come when he's the central man in a 3 man back line? He steps up into the midfield to play more of a midfield role in that situation.
How are you better at using the BigSoccer search function than Google? Here's an explainer on successful dribbles
I can use Google just fine, but why would I? If I need to search definitions to understand a point, then it probably wasn’t made very clearly. I see that you still are mad and are following me around. Hopefully, you won’t think about me all game again.
I think you're fundamentally misunderstanding how the internet works. If you don't know something you Google it, it's a pretty straightforward concept. People aren't going to include a primer or glossary of basic terms in their posts when they are commonly understood ideas. I truly don't care about or for you much, but for real, you shouldn't expect not to get called out on lazy thinking if you're doing it over and over again. I hope it's obvious that I'd challenge your ideas even if they were espoused by a poster that I actually liked--I've done this before and I'd do it again. And furthermore, I'm a happy benefactor of getting a lot of my writing, ideas, and thinking challenged here for many years and I'm a better writer for it. If this feels like harassment I apologize for that. However, I'm hopeful that you understand (perhaps without even having to Google) what I mean when I invoke the saying: "Everyone I meet is an asshole." It's not that "Super Llama following me around and waiting for me to post," it's that you keep saying the same dumb shit over and over again and expect other people to either enjoy it or to educate you on why it's wrong. This dynamic is boring to me.
Wow, I’m really in your head. It’s a shame. You can win. It’s not that serious. I’m certainly not looking up definitions of soccer stats to talk soccer. I’ll leave that to you.
"im not owned! im not owned!!", i continue to insist as i slowly shrink and transform into a corn cob— wint (@dril) November 11, 2011 You're opposed to learning new things and...proud of this stance? You do you bud. But again, I wasn't the only one who balked at your posts in this thread, nor before this thread. If you say something ill-informed or avowedly incurious, don't be so surprised when people call you out on it.
You called ME out for my inaccuracies?? You live in a weird universe. I’m pretty sure the opposite was true, buddy. And you can keep saying that you don’t have some weird obsession with me (and with making yourself look rather silly), but you are writing paragraphs about me not knowing WhoeverThe********.com’s definition of “dribbles!” And the irony is that you question my ability to use the Internet yet you think it takes hours to do a simple engine search. ♂️ It’s also ironic that you are telling me to look up the definition of dribbles without even acknowledging (something even caskccerdad has done) has nothing to do with what I said. Ozil used to be able to beat people in tight spaces and in transition. Yet, you can’t keep up. I learn things all the time. I also can discern from whom I can get advice, and you don’t make the cut.
STOP talking junk about different posters on Bigsoccer: DaPrince84 is KNOWLEDGEABLE Shen-O is LOYAL wanye_stirrear has THE COURAGE OF HIS CONVICTIONS The Jitty Slitter is WISE thebigman Super Llama is HILARIOUS
Fascinating digging here. I've wondered if this is down to tactical changes? Bremen version of Ozil played as the left sided forward in a 4-2-3-1. So you'd expect more carries out there. At Madrid he also made carries on the break in midfield - often moving out wide to get that space Perhaps in the heavy pressing systems we now see, he had changed his game? I think in world cup 2018 there was only one time i saw the classic Ozil where he used his positioning and pace to get beyond his midfield marker on the turn
That 2014 Ozil was in many ways a throwback to the Bremen version of Ozil While he doesn't excel in take ons the physical peak of Ozil was a player with huge sprint volumes and pace - one of the quickest players in the german team if not the quickest IIRC IMO the skinning of Gareth Barry out wide in 2010 is the sort of thing you have in mind. Then taken off after 83 mins because as usual, he had blown himself out. Sadly that version of Ozil was reconfigured by Wenger.
I asked Nice about this In his big season where he starred under Conte and one the league, he played in a 3
This is getting weird. You're presenting this as exculpatory for yourself, but the chain of quotes you're presenting shows you changing your definitions mid-argument again. First you're saying Ozil used to beat players off the dribble, casoccerdad says that's not really the case, then you say, well I've seen with my own two eyes him beating people off the dribble AND get out of tight spaces, then you shift to defending his ability to get out of tight spaces. Dribbling past players and getting out of tight spaces are different things and they're measured differently: the former with some variant of a successful dribbles metric, the latter with a "dispossessed" rate per 90. (If you wanted to contend that Ozil was once a good carrier of the ball in transition, you could point to his deep progression by dribbling metrics and have good evidence for that too) Once you pivoted to the point that he isn't dispossessed in tight spaces, you became right! Ozil is good at that. Which is what @casoccerdad47 is saying (correct me if I'm wrong soccerdad). It doesn't change the fact that you were originally talking about Ozil beating players off the dribble which he's never done at a high rate. This is also exactly what soccerdad is parsing: that getting out of tight spaces and beating players on the dribble are different things, and he literally says this in the last post you bolded. So your original post is incorrect, which is whatever, everyone is incorrect every now and then. What's irksome is your response to the correction: you pivot your argument by changing your definitions without acknowledging that, and also lash out at the idea of citing stats to support an argument. I'm not gonna get into the histrionics of the rest of your post because at this point that's hopeless.
I think his game transitioned most definitively during his time in the Ronaldo Madrid team. On this team it made less sense to progress the ball at your feet than to unlock through balls from very deep positions with Ronaldo running through on them. This was also when the transition to playing more centrally started. I don't have numbers to back up this supposition though.
Its not just that he was in a back 3, its that Chelsea’s midfield offered him more protection and the team as a whole was more compact. Back 3 will be exposed just as badly as a back 4 with no real midfield help and the team spacing all over the place.