F365 – Transfer news: Anderlecht’s Dieumerci Mbokani reveals Premier League desire

Dieumerci Mbokani intends to secure a move away from Anderlecht, with the Premier League his preferred destination.

A news article on 2013-05-21 15:27:00 from: Football 365

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

F365 – Lille defender Aurelien Chedjou open to playing in the Premier League

Lille’s Aurelien Chedjou is looking to leave this summer, opening the door for a possible move to the Premier League.

A news article on 2013-05-21 15:22:00 from: Football 365

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

TALKSPORT – Brendan Rodgers’ best Liverpool quotes of the season

From his David Brent-like buzz words to his cringe-worthy appearances in the unmissable television event that was Being:Liverpool, at times Brendan Rodgers has made it almost too easy for others to poke fun at him. Whether or not you agree with his methods, one thing is for certain, he knows how to get a team playing good football, and that is exactly what he has done at Liverpool this season.

A news article on 2013-05-21 15:00:00 from: Talksport

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

METRO – Napoli president reveals talks have begun with Manchester City over Edison Cavani and Edin Dzeko swap deal

Manchester City appear set to beat Chelsea to the signing of Edison Cavani with Napoli president Aurelio De Laurentiis admitting negotiations have begun over a deal that could include Edin Dzeko heading in the opposite direction. De Laurentiis was in England with the Italians’ sporting director Riccardo Bigon and managing director Andrea Chiavelli for meetings […]

A news article on 2013-05-21 11:08:00 from: The Metro

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

F365 – Premier League: Andy Carroll says thank you to West Ham for faith in him

Andy Carroll has thanked West Ham for getting his career back on track during a successful year-long loan spell.

A news article on 2013-05-21 08:53:00 from: Football 365

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

F365 – Premier League: Lucas Leiva hopes injury-free summer aids him in 2013-14

Liverpool midfielder Lucas Leiva has vowed to pick up where he left off next season given a summer free of injury.

A news article on 2013-05-21 08:27:00 from: Football 365

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

METRO – Steven Gerrard: Summer additions can turn Liverpool into top-four contenders

Steven Gerrard believes a summer of squad strengthening will turn Liverpool into top-four contenders next term.

A news article on 2013-05-20 19:38:00 from: The Metro

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

METRO – Christian Benteke in talks over Aston Villa future, admits Paul Lambert

Christian Benteke’s Aston Villa future could be decided in the coming days after boss Paul Lambert admitted talks with the Belgian international have been ongoing for several weeks.

A news article on 2013-05-20 15:38:00 from: The Metro

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

TTT: A KPI Framework for Goalkeepers

TTT: A KPI Framework for Goalkeepers

By TTT subscriber Lee Mooney. Before we get started… I was recently asked by someone, I’ll not say who, to give some time to thinking about KPI frameworks that could be used to support various player-centric decisions. For example: how much should a player be paid based on their performance? are there undervalued players out there that could be bought cheaply? should a player be dropped if their performance dips below a certain benchmark? As many on TTT will know, this kind of analysis is something I tend to avoid. But in this case, I decided to make an exception. Given that this type of analysis really isn’t something I’ve made much investment in, I feel the need to manage expectations before I get started with the story-telling. When these types of questions come up, I will often to defer to someone like Dan Kennett or Andrew Beasley. I just don’t see myself as an ‘authority’ in this area (an area that these guys have dominated, certainly from a Liverpool FC perspective, for many years). With that in-mind, I thoroughly expect these guys, and others, to contribute meaningful comments on top of the work I’ve done here. To avoid introducing bias, I haven’t actually spoken with them during the development – or anyone else for that matter. So, whether it’s considered ‘good’ or ‘bad’ – we’re all going to find out at the same time via the feedback on TTT. I think this is important. The most valuable experiences I’ve had on TTT, as an occasional ‘writer’ at least, have been when my work has been thoroughly chewed – so I’m not worried, honestly. Also, I don’t consider this work to be ‘comprehensive’ or ‘finished’ at all – I just think I’ve reached the point of ‘diminishing returns’ with the data currently at my disposal. So, why Goalkeepers? I decided to use goalkeepers for this study for one simple reason.  Their role on the field is relatively consistent both throughout games and across teams. Goalkeepers, by and large, do the same kinds of things in the same areas of the field across a large number of games. Other roles are much more dynamic – like chess pieces that can switch from being ‘knights’ to ‘bishops’ in the space of a few seconds – making consistent comparisons is actually quite difficult unless you can intelligently partition the data (in my opinion at least). So, if a KPI framework is going to be successful anywhere on the field – the goalkeeping role is as good a place to start as any. Especially as there’s been plenty of speculation that Barcelona want Pepe to return to his roots and replace the ageing Valdes. In which case we’ll need to be evaluating another sweeper keeper – Vorm, Mignolet, McCarthy, Ter Stegen? The approach My starting point was the 196 on-ball event metrics for the 2011/12 Premier League season provided by Opta as part of the Manchester City analytics project. This was quickly distilled to 78 metrics that have relevance to the goal-keeping role (i.e. one or more events actually occurred for at least one goalkeeper). I then prioritised the use of events that scored highly in terms of winning/losing impact using a previous piece of research which has been published a couple of times now on TTT. Further analysis and filtering ultimately resulted in 16 metrics which were analysed in detail (the calculation logic for each is provided at the end of this piece, along with possible six metrics to add to a later version of this work): Saves Inside Box Saves Outside Box Passes Final Third Passes Defensive Third Passes Middle Third Long Balls Errors Yellow Cards Red Cards Aerial Duels Ground Duels Distribution Challenges Tackles Corners Conceded Long Passes Exploring some potential insights I decided it would be helpful to consider how many minutes the various Premier League Goalkeepers actually played during the season, just to make sure that any conclusions/ideas weren’t affected by short-term outliers. Click here for the interactive version: For the purposes of subsequent visualisations, only players that accumulated 1,021 minutes or more will be included. The rest of this article is for Subscribers only. Member-only content – you need to subscribe to read it ! A subscription costs only £3.50 per month. Find out what you get with your subscription, or Subscribe now.

View the full story here: The Tomkins Times

A news article on 2013-05-20 14:46:00 from: The Tomkins Times

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.

F365 – Steven Gerrard says Liverpool must strengthen squad to challenge for top four

Steven Gerrard says boss Brendan Rodgers must strengthen the Liverpool squad if they are to challenge for the top four.

A news article on 2013-05-20 14:27:00 from: Football 365

Read the full article here.

This news item has been reproduced from today’s media. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of Kop That.