Our best post-war eleven (It's not who you think)

Dusty Bin! What's he doing these days? Is my memory correct that he scored on his debut against Liverpool at Oakwell?

 

Re: Statistically

Correct but the point is that "statistically" it's our best team (at winning games) and by team I simply mean the top eleven. I just posted it to show how ridiculous some of the names that appear are.

I don't think anyone was ever under the illusion that this is actually our best eleven. But thanks for the back up.

 

Ha, have fun "working"!

 

So it's done.

Using a fantasy football type of points scoring system I've rated all players to make a league appearance for us since the second world war.

Once again I can't stress enough that I'm not proclaiming this as definitive in any way. It can't be. I'll explain a few (not all) of the reasons why.

The points system is naturally flawed. Points awarded have been arbitrarily decided for a start.

The points system only takes into account a few statistics (detailed below). It doesn't account for things like interceptions, headers won, passes completed or even assists, purely because this information is unavailable for the duration of the period covered.

AGAIN...I'm not presenting the results of this as my opinion to be challenged by your own or not. If you think that Les Lea was a better player than Darren Barnard or whatever, that's fine.

So to the points system:

Players have been divided according to their position using a website called Hugmans Footballers. Great example again, Darren Barnard has been listed as a defender and a midfielder in various different publications over the years. A decision had to be made for every player as to which position they would take in this points scoring system. Barnard has been assigned as a midfielder by the way, in case you were interested.

Anyway, Goalkeepers and defenders score 5 points for a clean sheet. This is then multiplied by 1,2,3 or 4 depending on which division it was achieved in. 1 point for the current League 2, 2 points for League One, 3 for the Championship and 4 for the Premier League.

Defenders and Goalkeepers are deducted the equivalent number of points for the goals conceded in games they featured in. Again another flaw in the system - they may not have been on the pitch at the time a goal was conceded as they appeared as a substitute later. This cannot be determined without substitute times and goal times throughout which is again unavailable (to me at least). These goals conceded are NOT multiplied according to the division.

Defenders and Goalkeeepers score 7 points for any goals scored, multiplied again according to the division they were in.

Midfielders score 6 points for a goal scored, multiplied according to the division they were in.

Strikers score 5 points for a goal scored, multiplied by the division they were scored in.

All players score 1 point for a draw they were involved in (sub or start - it doesn't matter) which is then multiplied according to the division they were in.

All players score 3 points for a win they were involved in (sub or start - it doesn't matter) which is then multiplied according to the division they were in.


One good thing about this system is the cumulative nature of it, as opposed to an average nature, meaning the more games played by a player, the more points they can accrue. This way you don't get freak results like Paul Kane looking like a successful player because he made one appearance and we won or Nile Ranger appearing in the top 10 which always irks somebody.

Anyway, I've rated 736 different players. Here are the top 20:

Neil Redfearn 2540
Joe Joyce 2500
Nicky Eaden 2405
Clive Baker 2150
Phil Chambers 1979
Lol Chappell 1919
Gerry Taggart 1902
Frank Bartlett 1807
Arthur Kaye 1769
Jimmy Baxter 1767
Ronnie Glavin 1735
Gary Fleming 1734
Ian Banks 1702
Robert Wood 1667
Eric Winstanley 1656
Mick McCarthy 1647
Paul Futcher 1638
Gavin Smith 1610
Brendan O'Connell 1575
Stephen Foster 1561

 

Cheers for that, very nice. Interesting to see Foster beating Sir Bobby! Would that be due to Foster's scoring do you reckon?

Sent from my Moto G (4) using Tapatalk

 

Sir Bobby (1493) just missed out, he's 22nd behind Barry Murphy in 21st (1509).

Fozzie did score better in the goals points and also conceded less team goals (320 as opposed to Sir Bobby's 400)

 

Great work!

 

Cheers. Need something else to focus on at work now.

 

good stuff! that Glavin fella was crap wasn't he!

 

Hammill is our highest ranked current player in 75th place with 747 points.