Can Negredo and Jovetic Propel City to Greatness?

Due to the sales of Balotelli to AC Milan in January and Tevez to Juventus, Man City have decided to reinforce their striking options with the purchases of Negredo from Sevilla and Jovetic from Fiorentina. Negredo was the 4^th highest scorer in La Liga scoring 25 goals in 36 appearances while Jovetic finished joint 9^th in the Serie A with 13 in 31 appearances.

Negredo vs Balotelli

Negredo is the archetypical ‘fox in the box’ with all 25 of his goals last season coming from under 18 yards out.  He also has the ability to score with his weaker right foot and is a genuine threat with both body parts contributing 5 goals each. He is a goalscorer and his chance conversion rate of almost 20% supports this statement. His 1 assist and passing accuracy of 64% tells us that he won’t be creating chances for his teammates; his role is to finish those fashioned for him.

Negredo will be looking to replace Balotelli and with his from in the blue of City this shouldn’t be hard to do. Balotelli scored on 1 occasion in his 14 appearances, which was pretty poor even if half of his appearances were off the bench. His from increased dramatically after his sale to AC Milan, with him scoring 12 goals in his 13 appearances for the Serie A giants. Was his poor form in Manchester due to the poor man management by Roberto Mancini? At one point he was the only manager that could get the best out of a player that Mourinho had branded “unmanageable”.

Can Negredo Replace Balotelli?

Can Negredo replace the Balotelli of the 12-13 season? Without a doubt, this Balotelli was a shadow of the player of the season before. 1 in 14 is inexcusable for a striker of his quality, and Mancini was right to cash in during the January transfer window. The real question is if he can replace the Balotelli of the 11-12 season. The Balotelli that scored a goal every 102 mins. The Balotelli that scored 13 times despite being 3^rd in the pecking order behind Aguero and Dzeko. I believe that Negredo is capable of doing so, he has a keener eye for goal, is more experienced and is definitely a less volatile character than his predecessor.

Jovetic vs Tevez

Jovetic is left with the task emulating the workhorse known as Carlos Tevez. Jovetic is less of an out and out goalscorer than Negredo but like Tevez will contribute more to open play. His 13 Serie A goals and his 14.9% conversion rate is testament to the act he knows where the goal is but that isn’t the sole focus of his game.  Jovetic maintained a pass accuracy of 78% while providing his teammates with 5 assists and 50 chances. His role would be to lighten the load of David Silva while finding the back of the net himself.

Tevez signed for Juventus for a fee of £10m (rising to £12m subject to performance related add ons), on a 3 year contract. This spelled the end of 4 years at the Etihad for Tevez who maintained a strike of better than a goal every other game. He scored 11 goals at a conversion rate of 14.7% in his last season at the club. While it wasn’t his most prolific season for Man City in front of goal he provided his teammates with 8 assists. It also should be noted he created the 2^nd largest amount of chances for the club, behind the Spanish wizard Silva.  His pass accuracy was quite high for a striker at 84% with 52.75 going forward, again high for striker. The main criticism aimed at him was that he dropped too deep as he was the first choice striker for the club.

Can Jovetic replace Tevez?

I believe that Jovetic will not be able to replace Tevez, at least not in his 1^st season. Tevez brought too much to the table for Man City for Jovetic to be able to replace instantly. He is still only 22 so has plenty of time to mature, develop and truly find his niche, while becoming a high quality player. The question is will he receive enough match time to aid his development, with Aguero, Dzeko and Negredo seemingly ahead of him in the order.

Conclusion

Can Negredo and Jovetic propel City to greatness? If Negredo can reproduce his performances of last season in the sky blue of City than they will be back in the hunt for the Premier League title. A striker scoring you 25 goals can be the difference between 3 points and 1 as Van Persie proved for Manchester United last time out. If Jovetic can settle into the club as well then he could bring some productivity to the club. His goals and assists will prove valuable on a wet cold night in Stoke. The pair will be eased into the Premier League against relatively weak opponents in the forms of Newcastle, Cardiff, Hull and Stoke before they welcome city and title rivals Manchester United to the Etihad. The whole league will be watching this game closely as an early indicator to identify the team that will be on the top of the pile with the team to beat in my eyes, Chelsea come the end of the season.

Gareth Bale – Is He All That?

Gareth Bale scored 21 premier league goals last season. His performance left pundits and journalists raving about him, with comparisons of him to the very best in the world being made. Being an Arsenal fan I was never going to be quite as big of a fan of him as others are. I will now attempt to remove my Arsenal tinted glasses and compare him to the best wingers and attacking midfielders in the premier league and see how his performances truly compare. In this article I will be comparing him to Theo Walcott, Juan Mata and Santi Cazorla. In terms of productivity or DGI (Direct goal Involvement) these players were ranked 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th and 6^th, the top 2 being strikers, namely Van Persie and Suarez.

Goals and Shot Conversion

Player Name	Goals Scored	Shot to Goal Conversion Rate
Gareth Bale	21	15.8%
Theo Walcott	14	22.6%
Juan Mata	12	26.1%
Santi Cazorla	12	16%

As the stats show Bale was streets ahead goal wise and finished as the 3^rd highest scorer in the premier league but had the worst chance conversion out of all those being compared in this article. Mata had the best conversion percentage but scored the least amount of goals along with Cazorla.

Assists and Key Passes (The final pass leading to the recipient of the ball having an attempt at goal without scoring)

Player Name	Assists	Key Passes
Gareth Bale	4	71
Theo Walcott	10	28
Juan Mata	12	83
Santi Cazorla	11	84

Bale had the smallest number of assists but had a high number of key passes; this may be attributed to him not having great goal scorers around him at Spurs. Mata and Cazorla’s stats in this area are basically inseparable, leaving Walcott with the worst of the bunch.

Pass Length, Accuracy and Direction

Player Name	Pass Length	Pass Accuracy	Pass Direction (Forward)
Gareth Bale	18m	78%	55.3%
Theo Walcott	17m	83%	51.2%
Juan Mata	17m	85%	59%
Santi Cazorla	17m	87%	65%

Bale had the longest average pass length but had the worst passing accuracy; his forward passing percentage was also low, in comparison. Walcott, Mata and Cazorla all had a pass length of 17m with them having accuracies of 83%, 85% and 87% respectively. Cazorla was relatively direct with 65% of his passes going forward.

Duels (Take Ons and Headers, Percentages refer to Success Rates)

Player Name	Take Ons	Success rate	Headers	Success Rate
Gareth Bale	59(/138)	43%	57(/139)	41%
Theo Walcott	47(/107)	44%	7(/24)	29%
Juan Mata	21(/108)	40%	2(/5)	40%
Santi Cazorla	86(/131)	66%	6(/17)	35%

Gareth Bale completed the 2^nd most take ons out of those included and won the most headers at the highest percentage. In fact Bale won more headers than the rest involved combined. His number of successful take ons and its percentage pale in comparison to Cazorla’s though.

Player Name	No. of Greens	No. of Yellows	No. of Reds	Points Accumulated
Gareth Bale	4	4	3	16
Theo Walcott	0	8	3	8
Juan Mata	2	6	3	12
Santi Cazorla	5	6	0	21

Allow me to give clarity to the system I used to distribute and give value to the points. As you would have noticed, in each section analysed each players stats were ranked; 1 green, 2 yellows and 1 red. I will be using this system in future comparisons do it would if I you made notes for future reference. Like the system used widely in football, a green or a win is worth 3 points, a yellow for a draw worth 1 point and a red or loss equates to 0 points.

Along with the facts stated above it should be noted that Bale received 6 yellow cards last season, a number for simulation. 9 of his 21 league goals came from outside of the penalty area and he scored 4 with his weak (right foot) and also scored a header. He is a genuine threat on goal for these reasons despite his low chance conversion rate. That factor combined with his ability in the air, low assist number and low pass accuracy suggests that he would be better deployed in another position. In the current system that Andre Villas-Boas is using I believe he would perform better as the central striker or as the man playing behind him. AVB used I him in this position towards the end of last season to great success. AVB also claimed that Bale was “most effective” as a striker. I expect to see him playing more centrally at Spurs next season, assuming he stays at the club.

Now we arrive at the crux of the matter, is Gareth Bale one of the top 5 players in the league. He is definitely one of the top 5 attacking players in the league; he would be in that top 5 with Van Persie, Suarez, Cazorla and Mata. This is a comparison for another day but I guess he would be ranked 3^rd or 4^th in that chart. When it comes to the top 5 players in the league overall, he would struggle to make the cut, Arteta, Gerrard, Baines, Carrick and Yaya Toure would all be brought into contention.

Although Bale is not yet one of the best 5 players in the Premier League if he continues his ascension footballing greatness he will doubtlessly be up there with the very best of them next season.