Dispelling Myths: John Obi Mikel always passes it sideways

Chelsea won their opener today with a fairly comfortable 2-0 scoreline. Regardless of that fact, many members of the WAGNH community seemed to feel it necessary to get up in arms over the performance. In a trend that's becoming far to common for my liking, many of you immediately singled out John Obi Mikel as the weak link. With that in mind, I'm going to take a look at one of the most common complaints about his game.

Stop me if you've heard this before...John Obi Mikel always passes the ball sideways. Everybody says it, so it must be true. Well, MCFC Analytics has given us access to all of the Opta stats for the 2011/12 Premier League season, so now we can see if this is statistically correct. If you haven't yet read about the project, you can do so here.

For this exercise, I've decided to compare Mikel to some comparable players at the largest clubs in England (and Liverpool). Gareth Barry, Nigel de Jong, Michael Carrick, Alex Song, Oriol Romeu, Scott Parker, Sandro, Cheik Tiote, and Lucas Leiva all seemed to be excellent guys to compare Mikel with, so I decided to crunch some numbers on that group. Opta gives us totals of passing forward, backward, to the left, and to the right for every Premier League player in every Premier League game last season, so i broke out the calculator and went to work. After the jump, you can see what these guys did in this regard.

First, why don't we take a look at the midfielders mentioned above and their tendencies to pass sideways. To make this easier on the eye, I've just totaled the percentages of passes to both the left and right. I've then layed it out in a pretty little graph below:

Surprised? I think most of you should be. John Obi Mikel doesn't actually pass the ball sideways more than most of the other defensive mids at top clubs in England. He sits a little below the average in this regard, passing the ball to either side 57% of the time.

I'm sure many of you are now jumping to conclusions, making the assumption that these number just look this way because Mikel actually passes the ball backwards more than the rest of this sample. Well since we're digging through numbers anyway, why not take a look at that as well?

Shocking, isn't it? John Obi Mikel doesn't appear to pass the ball backwards as much as his counterparts do in general. As a matter of fact, he only does so for only 9% of his passes. I guess we'd better go ahead and look at how often he passes the ball in a forward direction...

Well there we have it, there were only 2 defensive midfielders at top clubs that actually passed the ball forward at a higher rate than Mikel. One of them is widely considered as the best defensive mid in England, and the other just got purchased by "the best club in the world". This doesn't fit the narrative that many of you have come to adopt, so you should really take some time to let all of this sink in. When somebody complains that Mikel always passes the ball sideways, they are just statistically incorrect. The reality of the situation is that Mikel actually passes the ball forward more than he does in any other direction, with just over 1/3 of his passes sent towards the attack. He also tends to pass the ball forward at a higher rate than most other defensive midfielders in England.

Does this comparison mean that Mikel doesn't have room to improve? Certainly not. What it should tell you wothout a doubt, though, is that John Obi Mikel does not pass the ball sideways more than his counterparts. He actually sprays the ball forward more often than most, and I'm assuming that's a surprise to most of you. There are fair criticisms to be made about John Obi Mikel, but complaining about his tendency to pass the ball backwards or to the side should not be one of them. It's incorrect, and it's not fair to the player. When someone tells you that John Obi Mikel always passes the ball sideways, show them this and let them know that they are wrong.

Source: http://www.ftbpro.com/posts/graham.macaree/43133/dispelling-myths-john-obi-mikel-always-passes-it-sideways

I'm not a BIG fan of Mikel, but the guy is trying.

story! story!! sto...ry!!!

Gah!! I thought dude had died!!!!

I was like. . .when did that happen?

Guess that was the intention of the Author, eh?

If the guy is not good enough to play for a premiership team....I dont think he will be there....BTW...people need to remember this guy played for the last two teams to play the Champions League final....even the best players in the world no get the title....lef the guy abeg....hin dey make his millions....lets enjoy his game while it last....And as for the OP....I beg...no dey use this kinda topic again...all man go think the guy don die now....

yes, patrick obhiagbon did not support fuel subsidy!

He's just lucky to be in chelsea jare !

mikel obi to me is over rated by chelsea fans,mikel is the only chelsea player that no club have been interested to buy in the past 3 years,i still rate Cheick Tiote higher than Mikel any day any time

kayoshi: Dispelling Myths: John Obi Mikel always passes it sideways

Chelsea won their opener today with a fairly comfortable 2-0 scoreline. Regardless of that fact, many members of the WAGNH community seemed to feel it necessary to get up in arms over the performance. In a trend that's becoming far to common for my liking, many of you immediately singled out John Obi Mikel as the weak link. With that in mind, I'm going to take a look at one of the most common complaints about his game.

Stop me if you've heard this before...John Obi Mikel always passes the ball sideways. Everybody says it, so it must be true. Well, MCFC Analytics has given us access to all of the Opta stats for the 2011/12 Premier League season, so now we can see if this is statistically correct. If you haven't yet read about the project, you can do so here.

For this exercise, I've decided to compare Mikel to some comparable players at the largest clubs in England (and Liverpool). Gareth Barry, Nigel de Jong, Michael Carrick, Alex Song, Oriol Romeu, Scott Parker, Sandro, Cheik Tiote, and Lucas Leiva all seemed to be excellent guys to compare Mikel with, so I decided to crunch some numbers on that group. Opta gives us totals of passing forward, backward, to the left, and to the right for every Premier League player in every Premier League game last season, so i broke out the calculator and went to work. After the jump, you can see what these guys did in this regard.

First, why don't we take a look at the midfielders mentioned above and their tendencies to pass sideways. To make this easier on the eye, I've just totaled the percentages of passes to both the left and right. I've then layed it out in a pretty little graph below:

Surprised? I think most of you should be. John Obi Mikel doesn't actually pass the ball sideways more than most of the other defensive mids at top clubs in England. He sits a little below the average in this regard, passing the ball to either side 57% of the time.

I'm sure many of you are now jumping to conclusions, making the assumption that these number just look this way because Mikel actually passes the ball backwards more than the rest of this sample. Well since we're digging through numbers anyway, why not take a look at that as well?

Shocking, isn't it? John Obi Mikel doesn't appear to pass the ball backwards as much as his counterparts do in general. As a matter of fact, he only does so for only 9% of his passes. I guess we'd better go ahead and look at how often he passes the ball in a forward direction...

Well there we have it, there were only 2 defensive midfielders at top clubs that actually passed the ball forward at a higher rate than Mikel. One of them is widely considered as the best defensive mid in England, and the other just got purchased by "the best club in the world". This doesn't fit the narrative that many of you have come to adopt, so you should really take some time to let all of this sink in. When somebody complains that Mikel always passes the ball sideways, they are just statistically incorrect. The reality of the situation is that Mikel actually passes the ball forward more than he does in any other direction, with just over 1/3 of his passes sent towards the attack. He also tends to pass the ball forward at a higher rate than most other defensive midfielders in England.

Does this comparison mean that Mikel doesn't have room to improve? Certainly not. What it should tell you wothout a doubt, though, is that John Obi Mikel does not pass the ball sideways more than his counterparts. He actually sprays the ball forward more often than most, and I'm assuming that's a surprise to most of you. There are fair criticisms to be made about John Obi Mikel, but complaining about his tendency to pass the ball backwards or to the side should not be one of them. It's incorrect, and it's not fair to the player. When someone tells you that John Obi Mikel always passes the ball sideways, show them this and let them know that they are wrong.

Source: http://www.ftbpro.com/posts/graham.macaree/43133/dispelling-myths-john-obi-mikel-always-passes-it-sideways

I'm not a BIG fan of Mikel, but the guy is trying.

nawa o

Here we go again...

I hate reading long story

Sisi_Kill: Gah!! I thought dude had died!!!!

I was like. . .when did that happen?

Guess that was the intention of the Author, eh?

Abi oh. wetin concern me with where/how he passes?

For a second there I thought he's dead... John obi mikel can be brilliant sometimes(as we've seen in some important games) he just needs to step his game up a bit. I think so many fans pick on him because he doesn't show enough energy on the pitch,hence they call him lazy. Imagine an old Kanu Nwankwo without his dribbbling skills playing as a DM! Yeah! That's how he plays...

I was expecting to read the cause of death and Obituary. OP, you well so ?

Some peeps can be stupid ehn?!! You don't need to quote the poster we are all talking about the same topic aren't we??

@Op it seems u always watch the back of tv when watching mikel play. Cos dis ur article is all the way wrong.abi u just wan relieve ursef

As far as am concern mikel is the second best mid fielder in africa after Yaya Toure... Viva madrid

I think you aя̩̥̊ε̲̣̣̣̥ blind if u aя̩̥̊ε̲̣̣̣̥ watching mikel I bet u if chelsea doesn't need his services anymore no big club will buy him a very depreciating player from an attacking mid fielder to defensive and probably to being a goal keeper who knows if he will end up as being a ball boy next topic pls

Opta stats is wacked , don't we have eyes , he passes the ball 9% backwards unlike his conterparts, tell me which of them mikel better pass, De jong is not in his class, lucas leiva has improved from his class with a higher degree , song will murder mikel anytime anyday.. You 4 no post this story.. Leave story for chino achebe!! Lol

If you play the kind of football called "one-touch" or "make-e-no-spoil-for-my-hand", you will understand Mikel's game. He's not ready to take any risk and that makes him less creative and lazy. Anyway, we like am like that.

Pasonaly, I fink Obi is doing ok, I jzt feel he has more in d thank, he's better dan wat he kips showing wik in wik out, he should jzt be confident nd try nd express himself more cos I know its in him.

Booty4me: nawa o

Its annoying when u quote the whole thread just because of NAWA O

Quite amazing how daft we nigerians can be at times.

Go read up on some chelsea forums and check out the guy's worth to the chelsea team. He performs his duties excellently as a holding midfielder. Thats his job. Yes he occasionally goes forward and one can see that he has quite the excellent passing IQ going forward, but he choses to remain back because that is he duty. Who is going to give the defenders support when frankie lampard is ALWAYS running to the box everytime chelsea has the ball?

Haters will hate sha o - thats what we do best in Nigeria. He's accomplished more and earns more than most of you that are bashing him.