Whenever the subject of which player might be the best in the world in their position comes up, it’s always a hotly debated topic.
Liverpool fans are in little doubt that Mohamed Salah is the best player on Earth full stop, but irrespective of that he’s clearly among the best forwards.
Alisson Becker is unquestionably one of the best goalkeepers around – as he proved last time out against Crystal Palace – while Virgil van Dijk was the top centre-back prior to his serous injury and is heading back towards his best.
But who is the top defensive midfielder? A recent article on ESPN has made the case for one Liverpool player being in the conversation and it’s not whom you might automatically assume.
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Answering a question from a reader in a mailbag piece, Ryan O’Hanlon claimed that Leicester City’s Wilfred Ndidi is the top central midfielder for defensive attributes because:
“Since the start of last season, he's the only midfielder across Europe's Big Five leagues who ranks in the 99th percentile or above across the following three categories: ball recoveries, adjusted tackles (per 1,000 opponent touches), and adjusted interceptions.”
Those are certainly an impressive set of statistics to have upon a player’s CV. Being in the top one percent of anything is obviously worth noting, and Ndidi ticks that box for three defensive statistics.
However, later in the article, O’Hanlon also mentioned that a member of Jurgen Klopp’s squad has been putting up similar numbers for these attributes:
“There's also Thiago, who's 100th percentile for ball recoveries, 97th percentile for adjusted interceptions, and 99th for adjusted tackles.”
Thiago? One might have expected to see Fabinho getting a mention in response to this sort of question, but not the former Bayern Munich man.
Opta’s The Analyst site does not have the Spanish international included in their data on top players for 2021/22 (presumably due to a relative lack of game time) but we can see his figures for his first campaign in England.
They make for interesting reading too. In 2020/21, Alcantara made 10.46 ball recoveries per 1,000 opposition touches, which wasn’t close to being the most by a midfielder in the Premier League.
But per Statsbomb’s data on FBRef, his recovery rate has gone from 11.5 per 90 minutes last term up to 14.5 this season, and only five men with at least as much playing time in the big five leagues have a higher average in 2021/22.
Thiago’s tackle numbers have increased too, from 2.09 per 90 minutes up to 2.53, with the number of players tackled going up slightly from 3.30 to 3.47.
On a ‘per 1,000 opposition touches’ basis, Liverpool’s number six was the third best midfielder in the Premier League for tackles last season (behind Ndidi and Oriel Romeu) so his standing has possibly improved in this campaign.
And though his interception frequency has dipped a little (from 2.04 per 90 to 1.47), Liverpool have a remarkable defensive record when Alcantara has played this season.
He has featured for a total of 790 minutes in all competitions, which works out as the equivalent of little under nine full matches.
In that time, the Reds have conceded just three goals, and the first of them had very little to do with Thiago.
Six minutes after he came off the bench at West Ham, Kurt Zouma scored with a header from a Jarrod Bowen corner.
The next goal occurred at Goodison Park, with Demarai Gray the scorer after Liverpool’s midfield had been bypassed a little too easily.
The final goal conceded with Thiago on the pitch was the one for which he was most culpable.
After losing the ball on the edge of the Newcastle box when the Magpies visited Anfield, Alcantara then made a poor clearance when defending the subsequent attack. The ball went straight to Jonjo Shelvey, who then scored.
Even so, the overall record is very encouraging and Thiago’s return to the side may help a Liverpool team who only kept one clean sheet in the five league games he has missed since then.
He’s best known for his sumptuous passing ability, yet Alcantara may be the game’s best defensive midfielder who doesn’t strictly play the position.
