The Premier League’s best passers are often discussed at length, given their unique ability to thread a ball through a sea of defenders to reach its intended target. However, there often isn’t too much data on those who lose the ball the most often, i.e. the Premier League’s worst passers.
While the intent with this article isn’t to have a negative outlook or put down any individual player, the reality is, is that some players and squads lose the ball far too often then they should at the professional level.
Simple passes between team mates from short distances should be second nature in the Premier League. And to most players, they are. But while all players have an off game, when looking at the data from the first 7 match weeks in the 25/26 Premier League season, it appears that some players are consistently poor at one of the most basic and fundamental skills in the game, passing.
In this article, we look to shed a bit of light onto teams and players that have unusually poor passing records after the first 7 games this Premier League season.
Understanding the Data: How Passes Are Classified
Passing has been discussed several times before in other FIVDA posts, but for those who are new to the blog (welcome!), here is a quick summary.
Passes are defined in three lengths as per the data set we use from fbref.com:
- Short – between 5 and 15 yards;
- Medium – between 15 and 30 yards;
- Long – over 30 yards.
For the remainder of this article, when short, medium or long passes are mentioned, they’re in reference to these definitions above.
Burnley’s Passing Problems: Losing the Ball Once Per Minute
On a squad basis, Burnley have the worst passing completion percentage in the Premier League at 73.2% (Brentford isn’t far behind with 74.8%). Meaning, only 73.2% of all Burnley’s passes reached their intended target (best in the league is Man City at 86%).
Or said differently, for any given 10 passes, on average Burnley loses the ball about 2.7 times.
Burnley have attempted 2,453 passes so far this season in the Premier League, which after 7 matches, gives an average of about 350 passes attempted per match.
When applying the completion percentage above, it means that Burnley are losing the ball from wayward passes about 94 times per game or about once per minute, when not including stoppage time.
The ball is being turned over to the opposition about once per minute due to poor passing by Burnley
When breaking it down on a per minute basis, the numbers are quite alarming. The ball is being turned over to the opposition about once per minute due to poor passing.
When looking at passing completion metrics broken down by Burnley’s short, medium and long passes, it is more apparent why their overall completion percentage is the low.
Breaking Down Burnley’s Passing by Distance
With short passes, Burnley’s completion is 88.2% and ranked 13th in the Premier League (for reference Man City is ranked 1st in this range with 93.2%). Burnley’s record in this range is about average when compared to other squads in the league.
Not to be overly critical, but for passes between 5 and 15-yards, you would expect every Premier League team to have over a 90% completion rate (Wolves are lowest at 85%).
To give a bit of perspective for the passes that are categorized as short (5-15 yards), the box is measured 18-yards from the goal line, meaning you would expect most Premier League teams to be able to hit their target at this distance.
Medium and Long Pass Accuracy: A Major Weakness
However, it is at medium and long distances that Burnley’s passing completion ratings weaken. Burnley are ranked the worst in the Premier League for both of these distances with a completion of 80.4% and 41.6% for medium and long passes, respectively.
For reference, the best in the league for medium length is again, Manchester City with 90.9% completion record, but Aston Villa rank the highest for long passes with a 55.9% completion record.
You may have read that statistic a second time, the highest completion record in the Premier League for passes over 30-yards is only 55.9%. Seems surprisingly low.
For the best league in the world (we might be biased) and for the squad with the highest completion accuracy for over 30-yard passes, only about 5.5 reach their target for every 10 attempted passes.
Again, said differently, the ball is lost on average every 4.5 passes when 10 long balls are attempted, for the most accurate squad.
When looking specifically at Burnley, they lose the ball every 6 out of 10 passes when attempting a long ball. With statistics like these, it makes you wonder why long balls are even attempted, unless they are clearances out of the defensive zone when in immediate threat.
Comparing Burnley’s Premier League and Championship Passing Records
When looking further at Burnley, it is interesting to note that their passing completion was at 88.1% in the Championship last year (24-25 season). As noted previously, this has dropped off quite significantly since been promoted to the Premier League this year.
While there are new faces in the squad this year compared to last, it underlines how much stronger the quality is in the Premier League.
The difference can be noticed on an individual player basis too. For instance, Josh Cullen has overall passing completion of 81.7% in the Premier League so far after 7 games. Last year, he had 87.8% in the Championship over the whole season.
Jaidon Anthony had 71.1% passing completion last year in the Championship but sits at 65.7% so far in the Premier League.
One interesting outlier though is Kyle Walker. Before moving to AC Milan midway through last season from Manchester City, he played 15 games for City and had an overall passing completion of 87.7%.
However, since moving to Burnley for the 25-26 Premier League season, his overall passing completion has dropped to 66.7% so far after 7 matches.
Individual Passing Struggles: Muniz, Gyökeres, and Perri Stand Out
When looking at the whole Premier League after 7 matches on an individual basis, Rodrigo Muniz has the worst* record with 30.6% passing completion. Out of 36 attempted passes, only 11 have been completed. Muniz has played in 5 Premier League matches for Fulham and started 4 of those.
When not including goalkeepers, Viktor Gyökereshas the worst passing completion percentage so far for a player who has started all Premier League matches for their team. Gyökeres passing completion is 55.4% and Arsenal’s worst passer (squad average is 83%).
The goalkeeper with the worst passing is Lucas Perri for Leeds United. While he’s only played 3 Premier League matches, his overall passing completion is 47.7%.
Perri’s short and medium length passing completion records are strong at 100% and 95.2% but his long passing record is poor. At 84 attempted passes over 30 yards, only 27 have been completed at a 32.1% record.
*To note, to qualify in the data set being used when analyzing the worst and best passers, a player has to have played for a minimum of 30 minutes per squad match.
Final Thoughts on the Premier League’s Passing Data
Well, that’s it for this article. In this post, we take a look at the Premier League’s worst passers. While we’re not looking to put anyone down, we do state the facts about those players and squads that lose the ball more than they should when playing in England’s top division, the Premier League.
As a squad, Burnley have the worst passing record after 7 matches so far this 25-26 season. When compared to last year where they placed second in the Championship, there is a notable drop off in passing completion, which can likely be attributed to the increased quality in the Premier League.
On an individual basis, passing completion drops to as low as 30.6% for Muniz but despite this poor record, he still managed to score against Brighton.
What are your thoughts on this passing data outlined in this article? Did anything surprise you? Did you think the jump from Championship to Premier League would be this evident in Burnley’s passing data? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
Stay tuned for future posts and please send us a message if there is a specific topic you would like to see covered. Additionally, if you have some ideas on how to improve these articles, please send them our way too.
As always, thanks for taking the time to read these posts!
JC
All data in this article is from fbref.com so, thanks to them!