September 26 – Possession stats have become a staple of the TV presentation package and an indication of how games are progressing – generally winning teams have the majority of possession. Celtic top a ranking of European clubs this season, with a thumping 70.8% of ball possession.
The latest data release from the CIES Football Observatory, in collaboration with InStat, looks at possession stats across 35 European national competitions.
Celtic’s table topping stats saw the Scottish team complete 659 passes per match compared to an average of 196 for their opponents. Celtic made 7.1 passes per possession phase, while their opponents only achieved three. The average duration of a possession was 23.5 seconds for Celtic and only 11.1 seconds for their opponents.
The stats underline the overbearing dominance of Celtc in the Scottish Premier League, but they are not the only league leaders at the top of the Euro possession table. Of teams leading their national leagues from the Big 5 countries, Dortmund (2nd), PSG (3rd), Manchester City (5th), Barcelona (7th=), all indicate that you can’t be the best without the ball.
See the full table at http://www.football-observatory.com/IMG/sites/b5wp/2017/196/en/
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