The CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post number 219 presents the 50 big-5 league players with the most positive gap between their current transfer value and the fee paid for them by their employer club. The greatest potential added value could be achieved by Tottenham Hotspur with Harry Kane: €198 million.

Another player trained by his club of employment ranks second: Lionel Messi. However, given Messi’s age, the potential profit for Barcelona will progressively reduce. Dele Alli is third with a potential added value of €164 million. The possible benefit for Atlético Madrid regarding Antoine Griezmann does not take into account the €100 million buy-out clause negotiated by the Frenchman during his last contract extension.

The estimated values are calculated using an exclusive algorithm conceived by the CIES Football Observatory research team. An increasing number of professional clubs and football intermediaries have recourse to the approach developed for transfer negotiations and litigation. The estimations for all big-5 league players are available here.

The 33rd edition of the CIES Football Observatory Monthly Report presents a comparative analysis of the presence of club-trained players in 31 European top divisions between 2009 and 2017. It notably reveals that footballers having been for at least three years between the ages of 15 and 21 in their club of employment accounted for almost one quarter of champion winning team squads, compared to only about one fifth for all clubs surveyed.

The ability to develop footballers for the first team squad contributes to the competitive advantage held by the most successful clubs. However, this finding is partially related to the current club-trained player definition. Indeed, after three years, a player recruited up until the age of 18 can still be considered as a club-trained footballer for the team that signed him. This encourages top European teams to lure the best talents initially trained by less competitive clubs.

A change in the definition of club-trained or association-trained players would be useful to ensure a sounder development of the European game. Lowering the relevant age range from 15 to 21 years to 12 to 17 years would be helpful in limiting the increasing speculation around the transfer of minors. Indeed, according to FIFA rules, communitarian players can only move abroad after their 16th birthday. This would de facto disallow recruiting teams or associations to acquire a training status for players imported as minors.

While having a well performing youth academy does not lead directly to success, the report shows that it is a relevant indicator of the club’s ability to look to the future. The existence of a powerful youth setting is also a good indicator of the club’s strength as a territorially embedded organisation. Beyond short-term results, investing in youth training can be considered a gauge for the sustainable development of the club as an institution.

Issue number 218 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post highlights big-5 league players whose transfer value has increased the most during the last six months. Only footballers who did not change team or extend their contract are included in the rankings. In the top positions are three English Premier League players: Mohammed Salah (+€74.7M), Ederson Moraes (+€74.4M) and Leroy Sané (+€63.0M).

The strongest increases for players from the four other major European chmpionships were recorded for Kylian Mbappé (+€54.7M) in the French Ligue 1, Paulinho Bezerra (+€42.4) in the Spanish Liga, Sergej Milinkovi?-Savi? (+€40.7M) in the Italian Serie A and Dayot Upamecano (+€35.6M) in the German Bundesliga.

Transfer value estimates are based on the exclusive algorithm developed by the CIES Football Observatory research team. Current figures for all of the big-5 league footballers can be accessed here. This unique widget presents the trends since last summer. For more information and analysis, you can follow us on Twitter.

The CIES Football Observatory has partnered with the leading football data company InStat to analyse the performance of teams across Europe. Issue number 217 of the Weekly Post lists the 100 clubs from 31 competitions with the best ratios between shots taken and conceded from the box during the current domestic league season. Porto ranks first ahead of Ludogorets and Crvena Zvezda.

Porto attempted 3.79 more shots from the opponents’ box than those conceded from its own box. The best ratios in the five major European leagues were measured for Napoli (2.93), Manchester City (2.87), Paris St-Germain (2.73), Bayern Munich (2.47) and Liverpool (2.23). Surprisingly, Real Madrid (2.10) outranks Barcelona (1.82). This finding suggests that Zidane’s side was particularly unlucky at domestic league level so far this season.

The top 50 lists of the best performing clubs from 35 European leagues for defence, possession and attack are available on the CIES Football Observatory website. For more information about InStat data and additional analysis requests, please contact us at football.observatory@cies.ch.

Issue number 216 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post uses OptaPro data to analyse the dribbling skills of big-5 league players. The dribbling index is calculated by multiplying the average number of dribbles achieved per 90 minutes with the percentage of successful ones. This allows us to take into account both the quantity and quality of dribbles. Three players clearly distinguish themselves in this area: Eden Hazard, Neymar and Lionel Messi.

While Neymar won so far a higher number of contests per 90 domestic league minutes, Hazard achieved a greater percentage of dribbles attempted: 75% compared to 62%. Messi’s success rate is also 62%. The highest percentages of successful dribbles among players figuring in the top 100 were measured for central midfielders: Mousa Dembélé, Mario Lemina, Julian Draxler, etc. This finding reflects the more defensive location of their dribbles.

Players trained in France are over-represented at the top of the table: nine in the first 15 positions. This reveals the excellence of the French training system and its ability to promote skilful players. The best ranked footballers trained in the other countries hosting the five major European leagues are Isco (16th), Zaha and Loftus-Cheek (19th), Draxler (19th) and D’Alessandro (38th). The technical profile of all big-5 league players is available here.

The CIES Football Observatory has analysed the domestic league experience cumulated during the last two years by U20 players from 22 European competitions to identify those with the best career prospects. Minutes played by each footballer were weighted according to the sporting level of leagues and the results achieved by employer clubs. Weekly Post number 215 presents the 50 players with the highest experience capital scores.

The five-star prospect category includes ten players who should be able to establish themselves in the very best European teams. In the top three positions are Gianluigi Donnarumma, Alban Lafont and Kylian Mbappé. Eighteen footballers make up the four-star category list. All of these players have a concrete possibility to spend the big part of their career in the most competitive European championships. Three-star prospects also are in a favourable position to stay or reach the highest levels of the football pyramid.

The capital experience methodology exclusively developed by the CIES Football Observatory research team allows market actors to compare talents across leagues on an objective basis. This is particularly useful from a scouting perspective. Last season’s rankings are accessible here. The freshly published February’s Monthly Report investigates the link between age and success in Europe.

The demographic analysis of squads is a key research area of the CIES Football Observatory. The 32nd edition of the Monthly Report analyses the age structure of teams from 31 top division European leagues. This allows us to show discrepancies on an international level, while also investigating the links between the age structure of teams and success.

The comparative analysis of the average age of champions since 2009 reveals great cultural differences in the perception of the most favourable age structure for a squad. At one extreme, the youngest champions are to be found in the Netherlands (24.2 years), where teams pay high attention to the training and development of young talents. At the other extreme, Cypriot champion teams had the oldest squads over the period surveyed (28.8 years).

Generally, clubs that are more competitive have older squads. However, after a certain threshold of sporting and economic power, the age structure of clubs tends to converge around 26.5 years of age. Between 2009 and 2017, the median age of champions in the five major European leagues was also 26.5 years old. In order to achieve success at the highest level, it is important for clubs to have as many players who did not celebrate their 27th birthday than footballers over this age threshold.

No club in football history has invested as much money in transfer indemnities to assemble the squad than Manchester City presently. Despite the loan of Mangala to Everton, the expensive signing of Laporte brought the total squad recruitment cost to a record high of €878 M. The data for all big-5 league teams is available in issue number 214 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post.

Manchester City outranks Paris St-Germain (€805 M), Manchester United (€747 M) and Barcelona (€725 M). These are the only clubs having spent more than €700 M to assemble their current squad. The economic logic suggests that the next Champions League winners is to be found among these teams. However, while money is important, other factors such as team cohesion can influence the course of events.

The average amounts invested in transfer fees by league and team varies between €97 M for the French Ligue 1 to a record high of €291 M at English Premier League level. The figures in the three other competitions of the big-5 are more balanced: €113 M for the German Bundesliga, €124 M for the Italian Serie A and €131 M for the Spanish Liga. In total, 42 clubs out of 98 have a squad recruitment cost of more than €100 M.

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Issue number 213 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post analyses transactions carried out by big-5 league clubs during January’s transfer window. For the first time in history, the total estimated spending was over one billion euro. Transfer expenditure increased by 36% compared to the previous record figure measured in 2017. English Premier League investments accounted for 51% of transfer indemnities paid by big-5 league clubs as a whole.

Since 2010, Premier League teams always had negative balance sheets for operations carried out during winter windows. The net balance in 2018 was -€113 M despite the expensive transfers of Philippe Coutinho and Diego Costa from England to Spain. These signings mainly explain the record deficit observed for Spanish Liga teams: -€188 M. The estimated balance sheets for the three other major European championships were positive: +€48 M for the Italian Serie A, +€33 M for the German Bundesliga and +€14 M for the French Ligue 1.

Once again, a high correlation (75%) was measured between values estimated through the exclusive CIES Football Observatory algorithm and fees paid by clubs. However, the majority of transfers were concluded for higher amounts than those estimated. This confirms the ongoing inflation trend in football players’ transfer market. The updated transfer values for all big-5 league squad members are available here.

The CIES Football Observatory research group is happy to disclose a brand new “performance rankings” widget. This exclusive tool allows users to assess the level of big-5 league players over four different time periods: last week, last month, last three months and last six months. Footballers are ranked according to their pitch production in domestic league matches using the unique statistics produced by the leading data company OptaPro.

At the head of the European rankings for the last six and three months is David Silva (Manchester City), while Lionel Messi tops the table for the last month. Among the players who obtained the highest possible mark for last week matches are established stars such as Ángel Di Maria (Paris St-Germain), Arjen Robben (Bayern Munich) and Cristiano Ronaldo (Real Madrid), as well as promising talents such as Álex Berenguer (Torino), Amine Harit (Schalke 04) and Moise Kean (Verona).

Two other widgets are available on the CIES Football Observatory website. They allow users comparing the technical profile of big-5 league players and monitoring trends in their transfer values. More information on the performance algorithms developed by the CIES Football Observatory is available here. This research note presents the approach used to estimate the transfer value of professional footballers.

The CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post number 212 presents the 100 clubs from 31 European competitions having achieved the most accurate passes per domestic league game since the start of the season. The Post also includes the exclusive InStat data on the percentage of accurate passes and the average number of passes completed per minute of possession.

All teams qualified for the last 16 round of the UEFA Champions League are in the top 100 positions of the rankings. However, the gaps are quite marked. At one end, Manchester City (1st) achieved 685 passes per match (17.2 per minute of possession). At the other end, FC Basel (94th) only completed 426 passes per domestic league game (14.4 per minute of possession). This is the highest gap between last 16 round adversaries.

The highest cumulated number of accurate passes per game for Champions League opponents was recorded for Paris St-Germain (622) and Real Madrid (540). At the opposite end is the Manchester United (459) and Sevilla (456) fixture. Our analysis suggests that these oppositions will be particularly even. The most probable quarter finalists with respect to pass statistics are Manchester City, Paris St-Germain, Bayern Munich, Shaktar Donetsk, Barcelona, Juventus, Liverpool and Manchester United.

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Issue number 211 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post ranks teams from the five major European championships according to the percentage of players signed from foreign clubs. Manchester City tops the rankings with 17 international recruitments out of 22 players fielded so far in domestic league games (77.3%). At the opposite end of the table is Athletic Club Bilbao (one player, Aymeric Laporte, out of 23).

The proportion of players signed from abroad is above two thirds in six other clubs: Chelsea, Lazio, Sevilla, Leipzig, Paris St-Germain and Udinese. In total, 29 teams recruited at least half of the footballers fielded so far from foreign clubs. English Premier League teams are over-represented among those transferring the highest percentage of squad members from abroad. Burnley (9.1%) and Bournemouth (9.5%) are exceptions to the rule.

In general, the most competitive clubs sign a greater percentage of players from foreign teams than lesser performing ones. However, this is not a fatality. Liverpool, Juventus, Real Madrid, Napoli, Manchester United, Barcelona and Tottenham all signed less than half of current squad members from abroad. The freshly published 31st edition of the CIES Football Observatory Monthly Report presents a deeper analysis of transfer networks in professional football.