PEDRI, A MARVEL OF A PLAYER
By Álex Delmás @alexdelmas10
Header photo: Getty
At 16 he impressed the Second Division, and just over two months have been enough to captivate the football world in general. Pedro González López (Pedri) is brimming with talent. But what footballing traits define Pedri? What are his main strengths and where can he improve? We break it down based on the Alebia Sports Analytics metrics.
Attacking midfielder, false winger
Pedri is a textbook attacking midfielder, talented and agile, but his excellent performance in terms of quality, vision and dribbling means he can fit in several positions. He has already shown this in a few months, playing on the right wing (against Madrid), as an attacking midfielder (Alavés or Sevilla) and even as a central midfielder for a few minutes at Mendizorroza. He has the virtue of being adaptable, a trait he already showed at Las Palmas playing in different systems (433, 4231 and even 442). Although it is on the left, as a false winger, where he is most comfortable. A piece who, by his characteristics, is worth his weight in gold.
Strengths
Before going into each point individually, as always, we explore the first Alebia radar to determine the footballing aspects that characterise him based on his metrics for the 2019/2020 season at U.D. Las Palmas and the current 2020/2021 campaign so far. A chart that highlights peaks in the final pass, dribbling and overall creativity. A first glance at this chart draws attention to two things: the change in style of play compared with last year and, on the other hand, the ability to maintain his level of play despite the big jump in category.
Mastery of space-time
Playing in inside positions is the hardest thing in football. Even more so in a team that, like Barça, plays most of the time in the opposition half. For that, it is necessary to control the four cardinal points from which opponents can stalk. That is, to control time and space. And Pedri not only controls them but shows absolute mastery. He receives in the “squares” in a fantastic way. That is, in those intermediate areas that open up between opponents when they shift across. And from there he sets himself up as the receiver of the ball to move the play on or to face the final phase of the attack. In fact, 57.14% of his passes are forward, a high figure that shows his attacking view of football.
Vision and solutions
Another of his great virtues is his peripheral vision for inside passes. He plays predominantly short. He records a volume of 10.21 short passes against only 1.86 long ones, which represents 72.7% of the total. And above all he is a differentiator in the quality of his passing. He knows how to tell productive links from those that are not so productive and has enough technical ability to produce scoring passes even in situations with very little chance of success.
Line-breaker
He has a lot of dribbling ability and, best of all, he has it in different forms and directions. He can break lines with a pass or with a dribble. And he can break out just as quickly on the right as on the left. So far, at Barça, he has been seen much more in the first than in the second capacity. In fact, he registers 2.62 dangerous progressive passes per 90 minutes. As for dribbling, he only accumulates 0.71 dribbles per match, whereas last season at U.D. Las Palmas he averaged 5.13. That said, his overall success rate on them is spectacular (100%). But one clear area for improvement is that he should dare to do it more.
Another very interesting Alebia chart is the one presented below, which weighs up all the aspects of Pedri’s offensive impact in comparison with two players of similar performance and positioning, such as Sergio Canales or Dani Olmo:
Smart in defence
But he is also agile and smart in everything. In defence too. He accumulates 4.29 interceptions per 90 minutes (a very good balance) and is good at anticipating. Against Betis he finished as Barça’s third-best ball-winner with six recoveries. It should surprise no one; there will be more to come.
To improve: excess mobility
Apart from the boldness in dribbling mentioned earlier, it is hard to ask more of a player who, at his age, is showing this level. Even so, a couple of areas for improvement could be pointed out:
Mobility is undoubtedly a strength in any player, but you have to know how to stop it when it is not needed. And that is something Pedri still has to finish polishing. Sometimes, only sometimes, he invades areas that other players could use. On the other hand, although it should not be a concern, he has room for improvement in one-on-one duels. Last season he finished as the worst player in the Liga Smartbank, with 49 ball duels lost. He will surely improve.