What do these men have in common?
For one, they’ve all scored big goals in a Champions League final!
Arjen Robben in 2013
Neymar in 2015
Gareth Bale in 2018
Kingsley Coman in 2020
Kai Havertz in 2021
and Vinicius Junior in 2022.
Players widely considered wingers scored winning
goals in half of the last 10 Champions League finals,
that used to be different.
It was always the central strikers who scored the decisive goals,
or sometimes the attacking midfielders.
But the winger, and their role on the pitch, have changed.
And its not just wingers that have evolved.
We’ll show you, whether it’s the Champions League Final or Sunday League,
like here at Berlin's Lichtenberg 47….
The first attribute needed to perform as a winger for 90 minutes or more is stamina.
That’s because these days, wingers run more than any other position.
Studies show that central defenders run the fewest kilometers a game,
almost 1.5 fewer than wingers.
Strikers run a bit more than that, and third place goes to full-backs.
Central midfielders are just behind wingers in second.
Football’s winger is also right up there compared to other sports.
Aussie rules football requires its athletes to cover the longest distance per match,
15.6 kilometers on average.
Football, fueled by those nonstop wingers, comes next.
Rugby comes in third,
followed up by field hockey…
basketball…
handball…
and tennis.
American football players run an average of just 2 kilometers a game,
baseball players just a whopping 60 meters!
One more thing: We are NOT talking about the super-superstars,
who sometimes get labelled as wingers.
We’ll focus on the"true" attacking wingers who have changed the game in recent years.
The ones who also have to do a lot defensively.
The wingers we're talking about can be found out here…
on the right or left side of the pitch.
Whether in a 4-3-3, a 3-4-3 or a 4-2-3-1.
Wingers have to be able to hit good, accurate crosses and dribble extremely well.
Plus they have to love looking for 1 on 1 situations,
which is a reason why many wingers love their position.
Our friends at StatsBomb have analyzed dribblings for us,
using a model that rates how effectively wingers bring the ball into dangerous situations.
Its called the Dribble and Carry On-Ball value, rating a players effectiveness on the ball.
We looked at the best wingers in the top 5 European Leagues –
this includes all attacking midfielders, by the way.
Real Madrid’s Vinicius Junior, with a rating of 0.23, has the third-highest value in Europe.
The La Liga average is 0.10
Bayern’s Serge Gnabry’s rating of 0.25 makes him Europe’s
second-highest ranked player when it comes to carrying the ball into dangerous zones.
The Bundesliga average is 0.11
Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Napoli's Georgian winger wunderkind,
tops the charts with 0.31, massively eclipsing the Seria A average of 0.10
But its not just about goals.
This prototypical defensive move from Karim Adeyemi shows
that wingers have newfound defensive responsibilites.
Back in the 70s, as these examples show, wingers were solely occupied with attacking
and in the 90s, like Louis Figo here, they also focused on their side.
Dribble, hit crosses, rack up assists.
But the main focus was on the middle of the pitch
with central midfielders and strikers getting the glory.
Wingers saw much less of the pitch than they do today,
and therefore did less running.
They just weren’t as involved as their modern counterparts.
This was partly because they didn’t have the pace.
Whether it was Littbarski,
Pires,
Beckham,
Giggs,
Camoranesi,
Extebarria - they all ran less and were slower out wide.
As we can see here, mileage on the ball for Coman and Co. has jumped 20% in recent years.
Its also up without the ball, as are sprints.
4 of the 10 fastest footballers in top leagues often play as wingers.
Ousmane Dembele
Phil Foden
Mason Greenwood
and Adama Traore.
When Usain Bolt broke the 100m record, his average speed was 37 km/h.
His top speed 44 km/h. But Bolt only runs one race and then takes a shower.
Wingers, however, sprint quite a few times a game.
And they have the least recovery time between their sprints in football.
Most crucially, the modern winger does a LOT more scoring.
Just ask Filip Kostic.
From the early 90's to 2017, Premier League top scorers were center forwards.
Without exception.
Since then, four wingers and only three center forwards
have led the world's best league in scoring.
There have always been wingers who scored a lot.
But for a few years now, this group has expanded significantly.
Wingers score more in general,
and a lot of them are decisive goals,
like in the past decade of Champions League finals.
But they still provide plenty of assists, too!
In 2021/22, the Prem’s top-three assist kings spent plenty of time on the wing,
attacking wingers Mo Salah and Jared Bowen, plus right back Trent Alexander Arnold.
While assists were always part of the winger’s job,
they now often have more helpers than attacking midfielders or strikers.
What is new is that wingers are now two in one,
a hybrid attacker that assists and scores goals.
And that's how wingers have changed Europe’s top leagues.
Wingers have been in the top 15 in goal contributions
– meaning both goals and assists –
in the Premier League much more frequently in recent years.
In 2011/12, only three wingers cracked the top 15.
A season later, same story.
In 2013/14, only one made it.
Center forwards and central attacking midfielders dominated.
This changed in 2017/18, when 5 out of the top 15 were wingers.
In 2018/19 almost half of the top 15 were wingers.
Then six…
another six…
…and again 6 out of 15 in 2021/22.
Wingers also contribute ever more goals in other leagues.
In LaLiga, the top 15 was long packed with strikers and attacking midfielders.
Only a couple wingers would make the cut.
But 2021/22 suddenly saw two wingers towards the top and four of them in the top 10.
And all of them were hybrids - notching more goals than assists.
Same in the Bundesliga: 10 years ago, only two wingers made the top 15.
In the 21/22 season, that jumped to 5 out of 15.
However: Unlike in England or Spain, here wingers don’t hold the very top spots.
Center forwards have dominated the Bundesliga goal contribution charts for years.
Strikers like Benzema, Kane, Lewandowski, and Haaland are still top scorers for their clubs.
After all, bagging goals is their job, it’s their real focus.
This means that much of football’s creativity has moved out wide.
That's where we are more likely to see special, unexpected moments.
Its important to remember that these days, there’s not one set way wingers play.
Some stay wide, burst to the byline and cross, others drift inside to shoot.
And remember, the actions we’re focusing on now are just as important in the attack as in defense.
On-Ball Value measures how likely an action on the ball is to create a goal,
as well as how likely it is to lower the chance of an opposition goal.
With 0.57, Phil Foden has the third best On Ball Value of wingers
and attacking midfielders in Europe’s top 5 leagues.
The Premier League average is 0.21.
Serge Gnabry’s 0.62 is second best, and smashes the Bundesliga average of 0.26.
Khvicha Kvaratskhelia again leads the pack with 0.69
the average On Ball Value for Serie A wingers and attacking midfielders is 0.20.
Now it’s all about attack: the xG or expected goals value
measures a players likelihood of scoring in a match based on quality of chances.
Sadio Mané and Mo Salah have an xG rating of 0.49 goals a game.
Ferran Torres has 0.51 and Serge Gnabry has 0.55
They’re expected to score roughly every other game,
a rate more than double their league averages.
And Ansu Fati’s xG rating is untouchable:
the Barca winger is good for an expected 1.02 goals a game.
Wingers are increasingly decisive players that shape whether or not their teams are successful.
Today more than ever, its up to wingers to keep the attack alive.
Without threats out wide, your offense will eventually grind to a halt.
Point guards, like Steph Curry here, are the build-up players.
They have a good overview and understanding of the game.
They run plays, distribute the ball and initiate offensive actions
– just like wingers in football.
But why has the creative element,
and thus the often game-changing element, moved out to the wings?
And that's how the winger changed football.
Or maybe that should be: How football changed the winger?