When you think about it, the standard categories into which we group football players aren’t very satisfactory. Midfielder, defender, striker. Those say little about a player, beyond where he stands as the game kicks off. So we add some more detail. Full back, wing back, defensive midfielder, “number 10”, “false 9”. And things quickly get…

The inaugural post on Hilltop Analytics introduced my one-page player snapshots. Now let’s put them to use in anger. There was a flurry of articles last month around the theme of, “Is Michael Carrick England’s Pirlo?” Searching Google for [carrick “england’s pirlo”] turns up 1130 hits, including a recent piece from the Telegraph. The Telegraph’s sub-headline makes…

Recently, I’ve been wondering what a one-page football player snapshot might look like. I like one page reports. They’re a good discipline to produce – because you have to discard everything you don’t really need – and they’re a fantastic way to keep a meeting on track. More than a page has people leafing through a…