A Look At Record-Breaking Frank Lampard’s Season in Numbers
The future of Frank Lampard is yet to be determined as Chelsea are seemingly stalling with his contract negotiations – by stalling I mean the England international has been rumored to have fallen out of favor with Roman Abramovich who is seeking new blood for his Chelsea side. Lampard has been linked with moves to the Los Angeles Galaxy as well as Manchester United at one point of the season, but it looks as if the London club will have to reconsider their midfielder’s future as the summer approaches.
Those that have followed Chelsea will know that Lampard has had a bit of an up and down season in terms of appearances. He started the season as one of Chelsea’s starting eleven under Roberto Di Matteo but quickly found himself coming off the bench in Chelsea’s third match against Newcsastle United. He started the Blues’ next match against QPR but then failed to make the starting eleven in the next four matches. After suffering from a calf injury, Lampard missed all of November and only featured intermittently throughout December. The QPR match that he started in was on September 15th and the next match he’d start and play a full ninety in was against Everton on December 30th – a time where squad rotation is a must for every Premier League team.
From there, his season has been a bit of a mix of starts and substitute appearances. He’s played fifteen full matches, been subbed off five times, and been subbed on eight times. Considering he was one of the main catalysts in Chelsea’s midfield that led the London side to Champions League glory last season, this is quite remarkable. What is even more remarkable is that he leads Chelsea in scoring in the Premier League with 15 goals – 5 more goals than Chelsea’s second leading scorer, Juan Mata, who has 10 goals. It is interesting to note here that Chelsea’s top three goal scorers in the Premier League this season are Lampard, Mata, and Hazard – three midfielders.
Lampard has actually only assisted one goal this season but has created 28 total chances. His average passing accuracy comes in at 82%, a number that is actually lower than Hazard (85%), Mata (86%), Ramires (85%), Jon Obi-Mikel (89%) and Oscar (83%).
Frank doesn’t just score goals, however. He’s shown throughout the season that he can still do a job defensively with 62% average duels won. Of the 35 tackles he’s gone into this season, he’s won 26 of them. Basically, he’s shown that he can do work on both sides of the ball.
So where do Chelsea go from here? There midfield legend today surpassed the club goal-scoring record and he himself has now scored double digit goals for ten straight Premier League seasons. Must we remind you that he’s done this from the midfield? Abramovich has to reconsider what his next move is with Lampard. With rumors surfacing that Mourinho may well be on his way back, the Portuguese tactician will surely not want to let one of his prized gems go. We’ll wait and see.
Chelsea fans, how do you feel about Lampard’s Chelsea future? Should he stay, or is his time up?
(stats via Squawka.com)
From soccerwithoutlimits.com