Control of the ball or simply hit on the counter attack having soaked up pressure – it’s an age old debate in football and a club’s style for many is sacrosanct.
Sam Allardyce ran into issues with his style of football when moving to West Ham, David Moyes and Louis van Gaal certainly felt the sharp end of Manchester United fans’ thoughts when moving away from Sir Alex Ferguson’s philosophy and most recently we had Leicester City run away with last year’s Premier League title whilst seeming to only be in possession of the ball for about 5 of every 90 minutes played.
With credit to the Express for the putting the legwork in on this one – statistics crunched prior to last weekend’s rounds of fixtures.
As ever, controlling the ball doesn’t guarantee success if you don’t do anything whilst you have it.
|
Pos
|
Club
|
Possession %
|
Real Pos
|
|
1
|
Manchester City
|
60.7%
|
5
|
|
2
|
Liverpool
|
58.8%
|
4
|
|
3
|
Tottenham Hotspur
|
57.1%
|
2
|
|
4
|
Arsenal
|
56.6%
|
3
|
|
5
|
Manchester United
|
56.3%
|
6
|
|
6
|
Southampton
|
53.6%
|
11
|
|
7
|
Chelsea
|
53.2%
|
1
|
|
8
|
Bournemouth
|
52.4%
|
14
|
|
9
|
Everton
|
49.9%
|
7
|
|
10
|
Middlesbrough
|
49.1%
|
15
|
|
11
|
Crystal Palace
|
48.9%
|
19
|
|
12
|
Swansea City
|
47.9%
|
17
|
|
13
|
West Ham United
|
47.6%
|
10
|
|
14
|
Stoke City
|
47.6%
|
9
|
|
15
|
Watford
|
46.3%
|
12
|
|
16
|
Hull City
|
45.4%
|
18
|
|
17
|
Leicester City
|
43.4%
|
16
|
|
18
|
Sunderland
|
42.4%
|
20
|
|
19
|
Burnley
|
42.2%
|
13
|
|
20
|
West Bromwich Albion
|
40/8%
|
8
|
