Issue number 383 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post presents the 100 footballers who have not yet celebrated their 20th birthday who gained the most playing experience during the first semester of the year. Borussia Dortmund’s and England’s midfielder Jude Bellingham heads the rankings ahead of the FC Barcelona’s and Spain’s duo Pablo Gavi and Pedri González.

Fulham’s FC Fábio Carvalho (7th) is the top ranked player outside of the big-5, ahead of Sparta Prague’s Adam Hložek and Martin Vitík. The podium of U20 footballers playing outside of Europe who gained the most experience since the start of the year is composed of Marcos Leonardo (Santos FC), Juan David Mosquera (Independiente Medellín) and Santiago Simón (River Plate).

The rankings were established according to the experience capital method, which takes into consideration minutes played in official games and their sporting level. This method allows us to combine into a single metrics players’ employment and the level of games in which they participated. More information is available in this Report and on demand.

With the 2021/22 seasons coming to an end, this CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post presents the Best XI for 32 European leagues using its exclusive Impact Score approach combining team results with player employment and technical performance as per InStat data. Tactical formations were chosen by first including top-ranked players in the most frequent position played and adding then footballers for complementary positions.

Players from 21 clubs were selected in the Best XIs for the big-5: Liverpool (6), Manchester City (4) and Tottenham (Harry Kane) in England; Real Madrid (6), Sevilla (2), Barcelona (2) and Betis (Nabil Fekir) in Spain; Milan (4), Inter (3), Juventus (2), Napoli (Amir Rrahmani) and Fiorentina (Nicolás González) in Italy; Bayern Munich (9), Borussia Dortmund (Jude Bellingham) and Bochum (Manuel Riemann) in Germany; Paris St-Germain (5), Marseille (2), Rennes (Benjamin Bourigeaud), Monaco (Aurélien Tchouaméni), Strasbourg (Ludovic Ajorque) and Nice (Walter Benítez) in France.

The ten youngest players in the Best XIs are Jude Bellingham (Borussia Dortmund), Arsen Zakharyan (Dinamo Moskow), Ilya Zabarnyi (Dynamo Kiev), Adam Hlozek (Sparta Prague), Nuno Mendes (PSG), Jakub Kaminski (Lech Poznan), Ryan Gravenberch (Ajax), Karim Adeyemi (RB Salzburg), Liel Abada (Celtic) and Jurriën Timber (Ajax). The Post also includes the technical profile of players selected according to fifteen categories as explained in this Report.

The 381st CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post analyses the passing game of goalkeepers from 36 leagues worldwide as per data from InStat. The percentage of long forward passes out of total passes stretches from just 8.2% for Paris St-Germain goalie Keylor Navas up to 83.6% for Paksi FC’s Gergö Rácz. Only goalkeepers who played at least 1’000 domestic league minutes (injury time included) were taken into consideration.

The record percentage of long forward passes (at least 40 meters with a span angle of 90°) at big-5 league level was recorded for Burnley FC’s Nick Pope (73.1%) ahead of CA Osasuna’s Sergio Herrera (72.2%). In absolute terms, the greatest value was recorded for Bochum’s Manuel Riemann (27.5 per match on average). Derby County’s Ryan Allsop made the most passes per game (50.0), ahead of Hamburger SV Daniel Heuer Fernandes (48.4).

Goalkeepers passing data heavily reflects the style of play of teams. On a league level, the percentage of goalkeepers’ long forward passes stretches from only 35.7% in the Turkish Süper Lig up to 58.4% in the Scottish Premiership. High figures were also recorded in the English Championship (49.0%) and the Argentinean Liga Profesional (47.5%). More technical data from InStat is exclusively available in the CIES Football Observatory Performance Stats tool.

The 380th edition of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post presents the 80 associations with the most players abroad in 135 leagues worldwide. Brazil heads the pack with 1,219 expatriates, followed by France (978) and Argentina (815). While the number of Brazilians and Argentineans abroad went just slightly up since 2017, that of the French increased more significantly.

England’s fourth place is explained essentially by the strong presence of players having grown up in this country in teams of other United Kingdom associations, as well as in Ireland: about 57% of the total number of English expatriates. Germany’s fifth place is notably related to the return migration of numerous players of Turkish origin born and raised in Germany.

Since 2017, the greatest increases in absolute terms were recorded for the French (+208 expatriates), the Dutch (+137) and the Colombians (+124). In relative terms, among nations with at least 100 expatriates, the highest rises were recorded for the Venezuelans (+86%), the Dutch (+60%) and the Austrian (+51%). More exclusive analysis is available for free in the 75th Monthly Report and the CIES Football Observatory Atlas of Migration.

Issue number 379 of the Weekly Post presents the top 10 estimated transfer values as per the CIES Football Observatory algorithm for 10 non-big-5 league top divisions worldwide: Portugal, the Netherlands, Brazil, Belgium, the United States/Canada, Austria, Turkey, Denmark, Switzerland and Scotland. The greatest value overall was recorded for SL Benfica’s striker Darwin Núñez (€71 million).

Darwin Núñez meets all the most important criteria for a very high valuation: young age (not yet 23 years old), long contract (more than three years remaining), playing for a competitive team (SL Benfica) and performing very well, notably from a goal-scoring perspective. Rumours of the Uruguayan striker’s departure for an English top club are entirely plausible. As the latter tend to push up inflation in player prices, a €80-million deal, as publicly reported, is perfectly imaginable.

The following players have the top estimated values in the nine remaining leagues surveyed: Antony dos Santos (NED, €57M), Charles De Ketelaere (BEL, €40M), Gabriel Barbosa (BRA, €39M), Karim Adeyemi (AUT, €31M), Muhammed Aktürkoglu (TUR, €20M), Alan Velasco (USA, €20M), Liel Abada (SCO, €19M), Anders Dreyer (DEN, €15M), as well as Dan Ndoye (SUI, €15M).

Only players for whom we were able to recover the information on contract duration were included in the analysis. Nevertheless, as contract information for the most prominent footballers is generally available, the rankings should accurately reflect reality. Transfer values estimates for players in the big-5 can be accessed for free here. Please contact us for more information on our services.

No team during current big-5 league season fielded club-trained players for a greater percentage of minutes than Athletic Club: 55.8%. The Basque side outranks local rivals Real Sociedad (43.9%), while Celta Vigo (41.2%) complete an all-Spanish podium. The Slovaks of MŠK Žilina (85.5%) top the table for clubs from 40 leagues worldwide. The data for all clubs is available in the 378th CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post.

The Colombians of Envigado (76.4%) head the rankings for the nine non-European leagues included in the study, ahead of four Argentinean teams (CA Banfield, CA Lanús, Rosario Central and CA Unión) and the Brazilians of Corinthians (56.3%). Club-trained footballers are defined as players who have been at their employer clubs for at least three years between the seasons during which they celebrated their 15th and 21st birthday.

At league level, the figures stretch from a record-low of 4.0% in the Greek Super League to a record-high of 26.0% in the Argentinean Liga Professional. On average, teams from the 40 leagues surveyed fielded club-trained players for 15.0% of domestic league minutes. Among the 42 teams who did not use club-trained footballers notably are Brentford, Bayer Leverkusen, Bologna and Udinese.

More exclusive information on clubs from 31 European top divisions is available for free in the CIES Football Observatory Demographic Atlas.