Destroyed by injuries? How does Arsenal really compare to the rest of the PL this campaign?

 

• How international injuries have decimated the Premier League
• Is the Premier League about to split in two?

By Tony Attwood

It is the New York Times that has the research in detail on this question of injuries and team changes, with a table concerning the number of injuries clubs have suffered this season.. Obviously you can go looking there for the full figures but here are a few headlines.

First, the total number of injuries this season.   Arsenal are certainly not the club with the most injuries – having 13 this season.  Brighton, Everton, Ipswich and Tottenham have all had more injuries – Brighton going totally bonkers with 19 injuries this season.  (Have they started playing on Brighton Beach?)

Several other clubs are close by: Aston Villa are also on 13, Leicester and Manchester United are on 12, and Manchester City, Newcastle and Southampton are close, on 11

But of course, the total number of injuries is just one way to look at things.  Another is how many games have been missed?

Even here Arsenal are not leaders, for they are on 48 games missed in all by injured players who might otherwise have played.   Way ahead are Brentford and Brighton each with 67 games.

A third measure is the average number of games missed per injury.   Arsenal are on 3.7 games, but Brentford are on 7.4, Wolverhampton on 5.8.

In the table below I’ve included five teams – Arsenal and Manchester C, obviously, plus Liverpool who are top of the league, Tottenham because they seem to be getting away with it and West Ham who are being Tottenham but even more.

Just compare the number of injuries and games missed.   When it comes to the average number of games missed per injury however clubs are pretty much in the same area.  It is the number of injuries and total games missed that tells us what’s going on.

 

 

Of course Arsenal’s numbers have been made worse by having Tomiyasu and Tierney out of the side from before the season began, and then on top of that it is hard to forgive our captain going off to play for Norway – taking himself out of the side for no less than seven games.

But there is another matter here.  Journalists, when discussing this topic, if they get round to it at all, often talk about a club having the “rub of the green” which suggests that injuries are all down to chance – as is the clubs’ investments in suitable replacements.

Of course buying back-up players just in case of an injury is not really a way forward since players of enough merit to be in the team get fed up if not playing so a certain rotation is needed to keep players happy.

So there is a balance to be had over the number of changes.  A low number of changes can keep a winning team winning all the time.  But not enough changes can mean that the resvers demand a transfer or are simply not up to scratch when they are suddenly called upon.

The number of changes is very different from club to club.  Manchester City this season is on 26 – and given the lack of changes they have made in recent seasons that explains a lot in relation to this year’s difficulties, Arsenal are on 18, Brentford on 12. showing that some clubs are making double the number of changes of other clubs.

As a result of their injuries Arsenal have only managed an unchanged line up once this season, although the idea of an Unchanged lineup can be over-rated.  West Ham, have managed it three times – and they might well be blaming injuries on a poor 14th place in the league.   They have recorded 13 injuries per 1000 minutes in league games.  Arsenal are on 17 – a whacking 31% more.

In the most ideal of worlds clubs would have three things –

• A backup player of quality in each position.
• Regular changes in the squad so that players don’t spend months sitting on the bench and then suddenly have to take over from an injured player.
• A flexible tactical plan to accommodate the changes that are made..

That of course is tough to achieve – after all you can imagine the outcry if Arsenal used their second choice goalkeeper for a match and he made a mistake meaning a game everyone expected Arsenal to win was in fact drawn.

Of course we don’t have that approach, but we do have league cup games, and occasionally Euro and FA Cup games against weaker opposition.   Indeed have a look at Arsenal’s lineup against Bolton (aka Notlob, if you have a long memory)

Porter

Calafiori Kiwior Nichols  Rice

Saka Jorkinho Lewis-Skelly

Nwaneri Jesus Sterling

So yes some opportunities are taken.  And so they need to be with this many injuries now happening – and goodness how many more there have been during these seemingly ceaseless internationals.