The Curious Case of Bukayo Saka: Arsenal’s Faltering Starboy | OneFootball

When it comes to football’s elite modern-day wingers, you’re led to think of some common names – Yamal, Vinicius Jr, Olise, Kvaratskhelia, in particular.

When asked about all of these names, the average football viewer, after having watched them a few times, can pinpoint the focal points of their games.

Yamal is an incredible, flashy dribbler with the right mix of Neymar and Messi to have a shout as the world’s best in that attribute. Vinicius is a speed demon, deadly on the break, and a nightmare matchup for fullbacks. Michael Olise is an elite playmaker, able to work a chance out of nothing. Kvaratskhelia is an elite finisher, and if given the ball on the edge of the box, will almost always find a way to put it in the back of the net.

However, there’s another winger most would call world-class who doesn’t fit this description. Bukayo Saka, Arsenal’s “golden boy”. Despite the 24-year-old having been on the scene for years now, it still feels hard to pinpoint just what Saka’s strengths are and what his game truly revolves around, especially in big matches.

So what’s actually the matter with Bukayo Saka? Well, first, let’s find what the English winger is actually good at. Usually, world-class wingers are exceptional in one or two of five main categories – speed, dribbling, scoring, playmaking, and production.

Let’s compare Saka’s numbers in these stats to some of the world’s best wingers.

A Poor Campaign So Far

Saka not having clear, strong attributes was fine, as long as the Englishman was producing numbers. Saka came up with 26 goal contributions in Arsenal’s 2022/2023 Premier League campaign, and 28 the following year. He now has just nine goal contributions in the league this season, and similarly disappointing numbers across the cup competitions.

All in all, in 42 appearances and nearly 3,000 minutes this campaign, Saka has just nine goals and five assists to show. He has fewer league goals this season than 34-year-old defensive midfielder Casemiro.

To add to the concern around the winger, his game time for a player so young also doesn’t bode well for his future. Saka broke into the Arsenal team in mid-2019, nearly seven years ago by now, already has over 300 appearances for his boyhood club, and his position isn’t looking like it’ll come into danger anytime soon.

The Hale End product has over 26,000 minutes of recorded gametime on his legs, at just 24 years of age. That’s just 5,000 less than the entire recorded career play time of legendary Dutch striker Marco van Basten. The winger also has more game time at 24 than similarly overplayed youngsters such as Dele Alli, Wayne Rooney, Raheem Sterling, and Michael Owen, all of whom took massive plummets in ability well before they should have.

Saka’s Technical Metrics Analysed

Speed:

Elite wingers need a good amount of pace about them, and Bukayo Saka has that. His top speed is over 34 km/h, which seems like a lightning bolt-type number. However, for elite wingers, it’s only around middle of the pack. Furthermore, watching his game, it’s obvious Saka doesn’t, and can’t really pace abuse like truly quick wingers like Vinicius and Dembele can.

Here is a scatterplot of 10 elite wingers’ top speed against each other. Saka’s 34.6 km/h places him squarely middle of the pack. with speedsters like Vini and Raphinha taking the top spots.

Dribbling:

If Saka doesn’t have speed, surely he has dribbling. I mean, you don’t need elite pace to be an elite winger, look at the bottom two on the graph – Yamal and Olise.

Usually, slower wingers can make up for their pace with elite dribbling, but watching Saka, he just doesn’t really have that. Again, he still has that great level you need to be at to be a top-level winger, but he doesn’t have a specific style. He isn’t flashy like Yamal, he doesn’t glide like Hazard, He just dribbles. He’s very predictable for defenders and doesn’t really stand out amongst the elite in this category.

Below is a graph showing elite wingers and their average completed dribbles per game. Yamal, with 4.7 per game, is in his own stratosphere, but Saka, with 1.8, once again falls squarely into mid-table.

What makes this worse is that the players who fall behind him – Raphinha, Dembele, Doue, Barcola, and Kvara – all have different wingers to share the load with. Raphinha has one of the most ball-dominant wingers in the world to play with, and the PSG gang each has to share the ball with three other elite wingers.

Saka is the focal point of Arsenal’s attack, and still completes less than two dribbles per game.

READ MORE: Why Do Premier League Fans Always Need A Team To Hate? Arsenal Edition

Inside Saka’s Creative Numbers

Shooting:

Perhaps you may not be all that quick or that great at ball-carrying, but if you’re a good scorer, you still can do well. However, as fate would have it, Saka isn’t all that great at shooting, either. How do we know this? If Saka were any good at being Arsenal’s main goalscorer, Arsenal’s main transfer focus for the past three years wouldn’t be a striker.

Also, see this graph, comparing our same wingers to Saka, this time, in terms of goals scored across all competitions this season. Saka falls dead last, the only player in the single digits for goals this season.

Creation:

Next, we have players’ overall playmaking. We’ve seen lots of wingers become elite just from being incredible playmakers. So, is Saka a great creator? Well, it’s arguably his best attribute, but by no means is he one of the best.

In this graph, we see players ranked by overall chances created in the league this season. While Lamine Yamal and Michael Olise are in a world of their own in this stat, Bukayo Saka is still just middle of the pack. He’s tied on nine so far with PSG’s Bradley Barcola, probably the most similar player to Saka in terms of these metrics.

Production:

Finally, we have production. While no obvious main talent can be bad for a player, it can be made up for if the player can consistently produce goals for his side. Such was the case for Saka in previous years, but this season, he’s hit a new low.

With just 14 G/A so far this season, the only players who come close are the four PSG players who have to share the load amongst themselves. Bukayo Saka is on track for his worst season since his teens, and it’s ugly.

While many thought that Bukayo Saka wasn’t pulling the load of a star player and thought that he may be slightly overrated, these metrics have proven true.

Saka’s numbers are far below the expectations of a world-class player, and something must be done. Saka is below many in G/A numbers who have missed multiple months with injury this season, while the Hale End product has missed just three matches.

While I’ve been harsh on Bukayo Saka a lot today, there’s still no denying that he’s a great player, and one day will retire as an Arsenal legend, but if he wants to take his boyhood club to greatness, he needs to buckle down.

In just five months, Saka will be embarking on his eighth full season in professional football, and he has no memorable positive big game performances. He isn’t a starboy anymore. It’s time that he proves he’s the star man.