Arsenal: Mesut Ozil proves that key passes don’t matter anymore

Arsenal fans used to swoon over our ability to make “key passes”, but all things considered, does the number even matter anymore?

It used to be a weekly routine for me to check out how Mesut Ozil‘s key pass statistics stacked up against Kevin De Bruyne‘s. It was perhaps the one edge Arsenal had. We had the guy making more key passes than anyone else in the league.

Nowadays, Ozil is still ninth in the league with 2.1 chances created per match. That’s a far cry behind De Bruyne’s 3.7. But what’s an even further cry is Ozil’s one assist to De Bruyne’s 15. So… De Bruyne creates 58% more chances than Ozil but has 1500% more assists (I’m not a mathematician… let’s just say it’s a big difference).

Meanwhile, Joao Moutinho at Wolverhampton has 2.2 key passes, just 0.1 more than Ozil, but he has seven assists to Ozil’s one.

All this to say that the key pass metric is a bit… dumb. I’ve watched entire matches of Mesut Ozil not exactly influencing the match all that much, just to find out he’s created four chances.

When? Where? How? What did those chances look like? Passing the ball to a guy who pops a shot from 30 yards is not a key pass. Sorry… it is a key pass. And that’s the problem.

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Instead, let’s talk about big chances, a stat kept by the Premier League themselves. We see a lot of familiar faces. Kevin De Bruyne has 21. Trent Alexander-Arnold, who creates 2.8 chances a match and has nine assists, also has 13 big chances.

Some other names that also pop up in the top ten of both key passes and big chances: Pascal Gros, Emiliano Buendía. Even guys who aren’t in the top ten in key passes rank in the top ten in big chances: Adama Traore, for instance. Only 1.4 key passes, but seven big chances. Andrew Robertson boasts the same.

If you filter it by midfielders alone, since we’re talking about Mesut Ozil, you see Gros and De Bruyne and Buendía, of course. But you don’t see Mesut Ozil.

That’s because Mesut Ozil, all 2.1 key passes per game and everything, has created all of zero big chances this year. In fact, no Arsenal midfielder has been able to create many. Matteo Guendouzi has the most, and guess how many he has? One.

Compare all of this to 2015/16 when Ozil led the league with 28. The next closest was 16. He’s been in the top ten every year until last season. Blame Unai Emery if you want, but Ozil has a chance to bounce back now and he’s still having his worst creative season yet. And don’t blame the strikers. The guy is working with two elite strikers, not to mention Gabriel Martinelli. So three elite strikers.

Forget key passes. It’s a stupid stat. Talk to me about big chances and why our “best” creator doesn’t have any.