Most touches of the ball, most dribbles attempted - stats for the 2023/24 season
Thursday, 30. May 2024, 14:30 Uhr
Ten days have passed since the 2023/24 campaign culminated in promotion to the Bundesliga. In part two of our review of last season, we look at which players had the most touches of the ball and the best pass completion rate, who hit the bar or post most often, and who embarked on the most dribbles.
Pass completion rate
Fabian Hürzeler's philosophy is based on lots of possession and control of the ball, and this is reflected in a league-best pass completion rate of 87.1 per cent. Centre-back Hauke Wahl finished second in the league rankings on 93.9 per cent, just a touch behind Kiel's Patrick Erras on 94 per cent. In Karol Mets (92.9 per cent) and Eric Smith (86.9 per cent), two more St. Pauli defenders featured in the top 50, as did Elias Saad thanks to a pass success rate of 87.4 per cent. The remarkable thing about that is that Saad is the only attacking player in the top 50 besides Wiesbaden's Hyunju Lee (93 per cent).
Dribbling
Two St. Pauli players were among the busiest carriers of the ball in the league last term. With 88 dribbles attempted, Oladapo Afolayan claimed third place behind Hertha's Fabian Reese (103) and Kaiserslautern's Tymoteusz Puchacz (96), while Elias Saad (76) narrowly missed out on the podium in fourth place. Compared with Afolayan, however, Saad had a slightly better dribble completion rate.
Woodwork woe
Marcel Hartel was the most prolific player in the squad with 17 goals last term, with Oladapo Afolayan and Johannes Eggestein sharing second place with nine each. Both Hartel and Afolayan would have had a higher return had they not been denied three times each by the bar or post. Only five players hit the woodwork more often, with László Bénes (HSV), Kenan Karaman (FC Schalke 04) and Ivan Prtajin (SV Wehen Wiesbaden) all denied by the bar or post five times.
Stamina
After settting a new stamina record in the 2022/23 season of 418.55 kilometres covered, Marcel Hartel was well on his way to pulverising it last term. Our No10 had already clocked up 414 kilometres going into the final game of the season at Wehen Wiesbaden, only to be ruled out by a cold, the only game in which Hartel did not feature. Hartel still had the highest workrate in the league, however, though it was a close-run thing. Wiesbaden's Robin Heusser ran an impressive 12.74 kilometres against the Boys in Brown but would have had to cover 14.84 kilometres to knock Hartel off his throne. In the end, Heusser managed a total distance run of 'just' 411.91 kilometres. In Hauke Wahl (356.88 km) and Karol Mets (349.09 km), the top 10 in this category featured another two St. Pauli players besides Hartel. Goalkeeper Nikola Vasilj, the only member of the squad to play every available minute, racked up 196.32 kilometres in the season just ended.
Touches
As in the previous season, it was a St. Pauli player who registered the most touches of the ball. Defender Karol Mets had 2,998 touches last term ahead of Magdeburg centre-back Daniel Heber in second (2,913) and Magdeburg keeper Dominik Reimann (2,560) in third. Our own Hauke Wahl (2,442) ended the campaign in fourth place, while right-back Manolis Saliakas (2,250) also made it into the top 10.
Photos: Witters
