Last October, we attempted to tackle a mighty question: Which players at the Premier League's top clubs are the most important?
We used a simple combination of ability and tactical importance to assess how crucial they were to their teams and ranked the top 15 accordingly. Naturally, the best, most consistent and most present players filtered toward the top, while also allowing room for the most tactically crucial individuals to receive credit too.
Six months on, we've revisited the subject, intrigued to see how things have changed. Football teams have to weather plenty of storms over the course of half a year, often changing, tweaking and recalibrating around injuries, absences and fluctuations in form. So we've gone and reranked the players at England's traditional Big Six clubs, checking in on how things have transpired since October, who has risen to the fore and increased their stock, and who, conversely, has dropped off.
To begin, here are a few notes about the methodology.
Why 15? Well, with 11 first-team players starting any given match, this should allow for those squad positions that aren't 100% cemented. Any long-term injury absences will be noted separately and not considered for the ranking.
Who is eligible? To be eligible for this ranking, a player must have played 400 Premier League minutes or more for their club. That's not a particularly high bar -- it's just over 15% of the campaign -- and the vast majority of important players clear that threshold with ease. We want to ensure the rankings feel truly up to date on who is important to their teams.
How can you rate the players? WhoScored has an algorithm that gives an overall number out of 10, but it lends itself more to on-ball actions, while this will be more subjective. "Minutes played" is obviously a key component of how important a player is to their manager, but slight injury issues can complicate that: We will use it only as a guide.
Are stats involved? Certainly. We'll look within the context of their position and, for example, will make a case for why a striker (goals, assists, key passes, etc.) will rank higher than a teammate.
How hard is it? Some of the decisions to be made are glaringly obvious, but others not so much. Comparing players across different position groups is a difficult task. Within the context of a squad, though, it's possible to get a feel for who is the most integral in order to form the ranking.
I disagree wholeheartedly with your decision to put X below Y. Will you change it? Of course people will disagree and a lot of this is subjective, but it's only a bit of fun.
Enough of that. On with the rankings.