0Who's the Best? Gerrard and Lampard
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As far as statistics go, Frank Lampard is a better player than Steven Gerrard.
In England, a debate has been going on about Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard. These two are the golden Premiership midfielders, the idols of millions. So who is the best?
Liverpool are not a patch on Chelsea domestically, but Gerrard has broken record set up by Ian Rush for Liverpool goals in European competitions.
And playing for England recently, Gerrard shone while Lampard rather limped.
So is Gerrard better than Lampard?
Not so fast, my friends.
You can work out who is the best player, but the calculations are rather complicated.
Let me share with you some work we've done on analysing the best striker because, if you can follow that, you'll see how we reached on Lampard and Gerrard.
We quickly encountered a problem in devising the best method of calculation.
Using data for every on-field action by every striker in the Premiership, we were able to compare the contribution made to a side by a particular forward, compared with that made by the average striker.
The statisticians simulated the entire season(so far) over and over again, replacing each striker in each team by an average player one at a time, to see how much difference the replacement made to that team.
From this, one can calculate the numbers of points each striker has added to their team.
Now, let me take Didier Drogba in order to illustrate to you the difficulty we had.
Chelsea have a sensational defence. Scoring slightly a fewer goals doesn't impack thair number of points all that much.
So even though Drogba scores freely, he doesn't add as many points to his sides as players in less exalted sides.
There is a way round this: To get a crude measure of who the best striker is, you simulate the season for an average side with the different strikers in and out of the team.
Why crude? Because Drogba scored his goals for high-scoring Chelsea.
Would he have been so impressive playing for, say, Charlton?
The two methods produce different results. When you use the average team simulation, Drogba tops the strikers' list, and Wayne Rooney, Louis Saha and Thierry Henry all figure.
Team data
But when you use the data from the teams themselves, former Portsmouth star Nwankwo Kanu comes top despite the fact that his contribution has been dropping off.
The performance of Blackburn Rovers' Shabani Nonda has been extraordinary. He only comes second because he spent a great deal less time on the pitch than his rivals.
Blackburn's Benni McCarthy is also right up there, while Bolton's favourite El Hadji Diouf comes bottom of the entire 82-strong list.
Bobby Zamora's contribution is also noteable given his relatively scarce appearances for West Ham.
Comparing this season with last, Henry had one of the worst campaigns in the Premiership and Jon Stead of Sheffield United one of the best.
Now back to Lampard and Gerrard.
Fortunately, the dilemma evaporates. Why? Because for all the guff about Gerrard, his domestic contribution is little better than made by the average player.
I know that is difficult to believe, but it is at least partly the result of the position Rafael Benitez plays him in.
Gerrard's stats bounce around. A couple of seasons back, he was receiving best player accolades but out model didn't rate him at all.
Last season, we raved about him, putting him right up there. This campaign we felt he's little better than okay.
Lampard, on the other hand, is a super soar-away player. Year after year, he comes top or nearly top of out table.
And this season is no exception.
He absolutely thumps Gerrard.
On one measure(the average team method), he is eight times better than the Liverpool star while non the other, he is more than 10 times better.
Scoring 20 goals from midfield is an extraordinary achievement but Lampard also adds his assists and his accurate passing.
Successful pass completion is a very important part of a team's portfolio. If you don't believe me, as Arsenal's side of invincibles.
So we can resolve the issue without to dispute about method. Lampard is, far and away, the more valuable player.
From TNP 7 april 2007 -
so long, can summarise?
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I see a flame bait here. This thread been available in every soccer forums in Sgforums!
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Originally posted by songsong07:
i can't sleep last night after seeing ur thread on that small little boy's hand kena crush
[b]I see a flame bait here. This thread been available in every soccer forums in Sgforums! [/b]
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SG
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liverpool is a team w/o many star players...tt y it make gerrard so special...chelsea a team wit many stars..tt y it make lampard feel so average...many ppl thinking tt lampard having so many goals..bcoz chelsea haf makelele doing the defensive cover...lampard can ignore the defensive job..gerrard haf better influence in the squad...once he score..he will pull up the team...but if gerrard haf a quiet game...the whole squad perform will be not up to standard...
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The writer is a chelsea fan
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stats don't tell the true story, this is all i can say..
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Write is a chelsea fan of coz say lampard better la..
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he backup it with stats and STATS can't lieOriginally posted by tarcki:Write is a chelsea fan of coz say lampard better la.. -
im a arsenal fan and will stay arsenal fan. im just typing what was published on 7 april 2007 on TNP. i dare to say i dont care about gerrard and lampard but i just wanna let everybody know, that lampard is indeed the better player, and it aint base on team's players, its their own performance. lampard and gerrard have being doing the same team, carrying their team up but concentrate on them more, do liverpool need defensive backup? do chelsea need defensive backup? but england sure needs some backup thus gerrard is the one for england, but lampard is the better one, stats are there, thre is no denying
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i din say u r a chelsea fan . i mean the writer of the TNP is a chelsea fan.Originally posted by glacer:im a arsenal fan and will stay arsenal fan. im just typing what was published on 7 april 2007 on TNP. i dare to say i dont care about gerrard and lampard but i just wanna let everybody know, that lampard is indeed the better player, and it aint base on team's players, its their own performance. lampard and gerrard have being doing the same team, carrying their team up but concentrate on them more, do liverpool need defensive backup? do chelsea need defensive backup? but england sure needs some backup thus gerrard is the one for england, but lampard is the better one, stats are there, thre is no denying
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yes.. stats dun lie. but is it accurate??? how many times is gerrard played out of position at liverpool. so i dun find the report tat ACCURATE saying lampard the better player..Originally posted by ghimpheng:he backup it with stats and STATS can't lie -
if gerrard cannot play as right midfielder, why does benitez and McClaren field him as a right midfielder?
he can play in the right midfield position, benitez and McClaren just need to give him the permission to roam to center midfield, same goes to Lampard, Benitez has now given Gerrard the license to roam. in my opinion, Gerrard is just not performing up to standard this season -
8 times better than Gerrard according to stats
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stats are just number, if you cant compromise wif your team members and urging for individual performance, you r as good as playing bowling.Originally posted by ghimpheng:8 times better than Gerrard according to stats
lampard is only good for club, but NO managers will want to select a player who is too selfish n nvr communicate wif his team members well. lampard in this case lose out to gerrard.
it is time for him to reflect on himself to learn to cooperate wif his team members, n not blast the balls n waste chance unneccessary like he did in world cup 2006. -
lampard cannot win the champions league for chelsea.
gerrard did. -
U sure?Originally posted by ghimpheng:he backup it with stats and STATS can't lie
Eg:
If i tell a non-football fan that since Italy the champions were the 2nd highest scoring team and have the highest goal difference at the world cup, they will all think that they must have played some of the most scintillating brand of attacking brand of football in the tournament aint it?But football fans can quickly point out that the Italian team is built on a defensive strategy. -
yeah, that season he was in superb form, we are talking about gerrard's current formOriginally posted by R3SsH|n:lampard cannot win the champions league for chelsea.
gerrard did. -
Put it this way. Their styles of play while generally similar, do have slight differences that set them apart.
For both their clubs, i guess no one can deny that they're good, i mean really good, as in world-class good. But for country, it's a different story and that's been the main problem. Why can't both of them bring their club form to the international stage.
Now to be fair, I wouldn't say that one is better than the other. They are both fabulous in their own right. Why both shine on the club stage(for Stevie G. when he plays in the middle) is because they train daily together wth their recpective team-mates. So they've built up an understanding with those guys around. Also, the managers' instructions do matter as well.
But for country, both of them have little time to form that kind of understanding with each other and their team mates. So the way i see it, Gerrard's style seems to suit the current (incompetent) England manager's tactics better. That is not to say Lampard can't fit in. He's simply a different player and can be used against different sort of teams. Gerrard is more direct and dashes into the box a bit more than Lampard who prefers to drift and most times start shooting from the edge of the box or further. So it's up to the manager to choose who to build his team on and how to do it.
As for statistics, consider this statement by the famous Mark Twain: "There are three kinds of lies, lies, damned lies and statistics." Go figure -
u r wrong... i feel benitez has no choice but to put gerrard there. 1st Liverpool only have 1 right winger. (pennent) some more his form is on n off. 2nd xabi is like more of a passer den a hard tackling dmc, thats y sissoko is deploy to do all the dirty work. Bo bian gerrard needs to play on the right to give balance to the team.Originally posted by glacer:if gerrard cannot play as right midfielder, why does benitez and McClaren field him as a right midfielder?
he can play in the right midfield position, benitez and McClaren just need to give him the permission to roam to center midfield, same goes to Lampard, Benitez has now given Gerrard the license to roam. in my opinion, Gerrard is just not performing up to standard this season -
form is temporary,class is forever.Originally posted by glacer:yeah, that season he was in superb form, we are talking about gerrard's current form -
built on defensive strategy does not mean cannot score many goalsOriginally posted by lpx88:U sure?
Eg:
If i tell a non-football fan that since Italy the champions were the 2nd highest scoring team and have the highest goal difference at the world cup, they will all think that they must have played some of the most scintillating brand of attacking brand of football in the tournament aint it?But football fans can quickly point out that the Italian team is built on a defensive strategy.
it is still 11 vs 11 afterall -
My point is if i present the facts to a non football fan liddat , looking only at stats one will think they are 1 of the the most attacking minded team aint it?And one as a non football fan look at the facts only and dono that a team built on defensive strategy can also score goalsOriginally posted by ghimpheng:built on defensive strategy does not mean cannot score many goals
it is still 11 vs 11 afterall -
in part it's cuz of that, in part i guess rafa just wanted to try and fit the biggest names and most consistent performers in. i personally feel that liverpool can play a 4-3-3 formation when attacking that switches to 4-5-1 when defending. familiar? chelsea did that. pool have the players as well, but i think rafa is just trying to go for something more balanced, hence with Gerrard's versatility and Pennant's inconsistency, Gerrard will at times play on the flanks.Originally posted by tarcki:u r wrong... i feel benitez has no choice but to put gerrard there. 1st Liverpool only have 1 right winger. (pennent) some more his form is on n off. 2nd xabi is like more of a passer den a hard tackling dmc, thats y sissoko is deploy to do all the dirty work. Bo bian gerrard needs to play on the right to give balance to the team.