Armchair Analyst: Matt Doyle

Armchair Analyst: One big question for Sporting Kansas City

A Big Question:Will they once again push Graham Zusi so high?


Sporting KC put together their best attacking season in club history, and did so in large part because they threw caution to the wind with regard to Zusi's role.


This is ridiculous:

Player
Passes, ending in Final Third
Nicolas Lodeiro
926
Maxi Moralez
909
Miguel Almirón
891
Ilie Sánchez
847
Kaku
829
Luciano Acosta
817
Sebastian Blanco
783
Graham Zusi
776
Borek Dockal
774
Federico Higuaín
772
Roger Espinoza
761
Diego Valeri
751
Saphir Taïder
692
Sacha Kljestan
672
Sean Davis
662
Darwin Quintero
628
Benny Feilhaber
609
Carlos Vela
608
Haris Medunjanin
604
Julian Gressel
600
Michael Bradley
589
Harrison Afful
582
Alejandro Bedoya
572
Tyler Adams
560
Diego Fagundez
557

Zusi spent more time in the attacking third than any other defender in the league, by MILES, hitting nearly 200 more final third passes than Harrison Afful (the only other defender who shows up in the top 40). Hell, he spent more time there than most midfielders. With Zusi out there SKC were effectively playing a 3-4-3 in attack.


I think it caught a lot of teams by surprise in 2018. It won't in 2019 after a year's worth of dissecting film.



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