Gradient Sports

Which Premier League Players Should Shoot More — and Who Should Shoot Less?

When you manually evaluate every shot in the Premier League, you can assess subjective matters with more confidence.

Using Better Option %, we look at which players should shoot more, and who should shoot less this season.

👇

www.gradientsports.com/blog/better-...

thanks for sharing!

Add PSG to the list of teams chasing Morgan Rogers...

www.espn.com/soccer/story...

(📊 @gradientsports.bsky.social)

We cover Europe’s top 5 leagues, but his grades will be normalised among Ligue 1 players only

Introducing On-Ball Acceleration Metrics

Accelerating past an opponent with the ball is one of football’s hardest skills — and until now, difficult to measure.

Our frame-by-frame tracking includes possession indicators, allowing us to verify ball control throughout an acceleration effort.

www.gradientsports.com/blog/introdu...

Looking Beyond Traditional Metrics: Understanding William Saliba’s Defensive Value

Traditional data will tell you that William Saliba's 41.3% Challenge win percentage ranks last among CBs in the Premier League this season

What it doesn't tell you is that his ball control and defensive positioning are among Europe's elite ⬇️

www.gradientsports.com/blog/looking...

#AFC

📈

The next elite talent?

In the Bundesliga this season, only Michael Olise has completed more dribbles and received more passes opening their body than 19-year-old Yan Diomande.

Direct 🏃‍♂️💨

Why Stability Matters When Evaluating Goalkeeper Performance

We examined which goalkeeper metrics are the most stable for evaluating performance.

Using Spearman correlations, we found that avoiding negative actions is far more stable than save percentage or PSxG. 📊⬇️

www.gradientsports.com/blog/why-sta...

No player in Serie A this season has more positively graded passes (74, execution) or line-breaking passes completed (120, progression) than Luka Modric

Still among the very best at 40 years old 👏

Finding Transfer Replacements: Data-Driven Options for Premier League Clubs Facing Departures A data-led look at potential replacements for Premier League standouts who may move in the January window.

How do you go about replacing players like Elliot Anderson, Marc Guehi and Carlos Baleba?

Using Gradient Sports grades and metrics, we profile some realistic, data-aligned successors ⬇️

#NFFC #CPFC #BHAFC

www.gradientsports.com/blog/finding...

The Rise of Elliot Anderson - The data behind his remarkable 2025/26 season

Elliot Anderson has emerged as one of the most important players for both club and country this season.

We examine Anderson's Premier League data set, where he leads the Premier League in 10+ categories.

#NFFC 🌳

www.gradientsports.com/blog/the-ris...

Important shifts, as I went through @gradientsports.bsky.social data:

— Arsenal now lead the league in “open play power shots” (26)
— This is 12 more than the second-highest team
— Arsenal have the highest percentage of “power shots” in the league (19%)
— Eze leads this league (7).

Sport Republic Partners with Gradient to Elevate Data-Driven Football Decisions Sport Republic partners with Gradient to unlock advanced football analytics. From recruitment insights to off-ball player movement, discover how data is shaping the future of the game.

Gradient Sports is delighted to sign a partnership with Sport Republic and their portfolio of clubs to empower their decision-making with industry-leading broadcast tracking, physical metrics, and off-ball run data. 📊⬇️

| #SaintsFC #Göztepe |

www.gradientsports.com/blog/sport-r...

Marc Guehi performed above his positional average in every defensive category last season 📊📈

#CPFC #LFC

Combining Gradient Sports Player Grades with Pass Clusters By grouping passes based on their spatial characteristics and evaluating execution quality, we reveal not only how teams pass—but how well they do it.

Senior Data Scientist Mehmet Erden examines how our player grading system integrates with pass clustering models to identify the types of passes Premier League teams consistently execute well 🎯📊

Read here: www.gradientsports.com/blog/using-g...

Open Letter from the CEO: PFF FC rebrands to Gradient Sports CEO Nate Gerstle discusses the process of the rebrand from PFF FC to Gradient Sports

Open Letter from the CEO: PFF FC rebrands to Gradient Sports

Read here ⬇️

www.gradientsports.com/blog/open-le...

PFF FC is now Gradient Sports! 🚨

After securing investment to increase our event data coverage and unique player grading system, we are delighted to announce that we have spun off from PFF to form Gradient Sports.

For more information, visit: gradientsports.com

The model was built using 64 games of World Cup 2022 tracking and event data (publicly available through @pff-fc.bsky.social), and using only open-source Python libraries (𝐤𝐥𝐨𝐩𝐩𝐲 and 𝐮𝐧𝐫𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐬).

🌀 𝐎𝐩𝐞𝐧-𝐒𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐜𝐞 𝐅𝐨𝐨𝐭𝐛𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐀𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐲𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬 @ 𝐏𝐲𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚 𝐋𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐨𝐧 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟓

On Saturday I presented a Graph Neural Network Expected Possession Value model at @pydatalondon.bsky.social 2025.

This 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐡𝐄𝐏𝐕 model is an ML approach that predicts scoring probability for any moment in the game

🔗 tinyurl.com/pydata-ldn25

Carlos Baleba is just one of seven players in the Premier League this season to register eight 70+ grades

Excelling in both transition (ball carrying, passing) and in defence (50/50 duels, aerial duels)

A complete player 💪

#BHAFC

The Top 50 Players from the 2024/25 Premier League Season — PFF FC BLOG PFF FC rank the Top 50 Players in the 2024/25 Premier League season, using PFF FC Grades and Metrics.

Ranking the Top 50 Players from the 2024/25 Premier League season, starting with 50-41 📈

50: Emmanuel Agbadou
49: ???
43: Mateo Kovacic

Read here ⬇️

www.blog.fc.pff.com/blog/top50-p...

The leader in each line-breaking category in the Premier League this season 🎯

| #MCFC #AVFC |

Enhancing Player Performance Analysis with Epitome Physical Metrics Join PFF FC experts for an exclusive webinar exploring Epitome, our cutting-edge physical metrics platform. We’ll demonstrate how Epitome’s best-in-class…

Join us for a webinar exploring our physical metrics platform – Epitome 📊

We’ll demonstrate how Epitome’s best-in-class player recognition, possession-based filters, and comprehensive distance, count, and intensity data can transform your workflows

Sign up here: vimeo.com/event/512981...

Dean Huijsen in the Premier League this season:

• 84.7 Challenge Grade (7th/96 CBs)
• 8.34 Passes Completed in the final third p90 (5th/96)
• 0.72 positional mistakes p90 (4th best/96)

A serious talent at 20 years old 📈

#afcb

Line-breaking passes received in the Premier League this season:

Morgan Rogers - 274
Ryan Gravenberch - 237
Bruno Guimarães - 237
Cole Palmer - 221
Bruno Fernandes - 220

#AVFC

PFF FC are hiring part-time Data Collection Analysts — PFF FC BLOG PFF FC are hiring for part-time Data Collection Analysts to add to our team ready for the 2025-26 Season.

Want to work in Football? ⚽️

We are looking for part-time Data Collection Analysts to add to our team, ready for the 2025-26 Season.

If you’re interested, apply below ⬇️

www.blog.fc.pff.com/blog/pff-fc-...

We look at the data behind some of the biggest moves in the January Transfer window, including:

📈 Rashford and Asensio
🏃‍♂️ Marmoush and Khusanov's speed
💪 Emmanuel Agbadou transforming Wolves

| #AVFC #MCFC #WWFC ⬇️ |

www.blog.fc.pff.com/blog/transfe...

Virgil van Dijk in the Premier League this season:

92.3 Aerial Duel Grade - 1st in PL
80.1 Challenge Grade - 3rd in PL
83.8 Passing Grade - 2nd among CBs

Dominant 💪

#LFC #LiverpoolFC

Liverpool’s Big Three - Are they still playing at an elite level? — PFF FC BLOG We take a look at how Mohamed Salah, Trent Alexander-Arnold, and Virgil van Dijk have performed this season in the final year of their contracts.

Mo Salah in the Premier League this season:

🔺 Leads PL in shots (106) & unsavable goals (19)
🔺 Most passes into a dangerous position (127)
🔺 30% of dribbles create a threat – best in the league

Still elite at 32. Read the full breakdown👇

🔗 www.blog.fc.pff.com/blog/lfc-con...