Byrne, Burns and Boyd – stand-out individual player performance stats from 2022 Premier Division

Having looked in recent days at the statistics around team performances in the Premier Division, we now take a look at the data from Wyscout for the individual players in the top flight of the League of Ireland.

Expected goals deliver great expectations – a statistical review of team performance in the LOI Premier Division https://t.co/p5lNAkOeJUpic.twitter.com/b1I18gDGgs

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Goals, shots and penalty area touches

In terms of goalscorers, Sligo Rovers’ Aidan Keena topped the goalscoring charts with 17 strikes. Remarkably, it was the first time a Bit O’Red forward was top scorer since Johnny Brooks scored 15 goals in the 1966/67 season.

Keena averaged 0.57 goals per 90 minutes which was slightly below Graham Burke’s ratio of 0.62 ratio. The Shamrock Rovers forward scored 11 goals including converting all four penalty kicks he took. Keena also scored four penalty kicks but missed another one.

The Sligo Rovers player was second in the shot list with 104 (3.5 per 90 minutes) behind Jamie McGongle’s 118 shots (4.2 per 90 minutes). Liam Burt, lining out for Bohs, was third with 78 (3.6 per 90 minutes).

McGonigle also topped the touches in the penalty area charts with 5.4 per 90 minutes ahead of Shamrock Rovers duo Rory Gaffney (5.1) and Aaron Greene (4.8).

Sean Boyd

Shelbourne striker Sean Boyd topped the penalty kick charts scoring six from six (Bohs’ Dawson Devoy scored five from five) and the 6 foot 4 forward won the most duels (36 per 90 minutes) and aerial duels (14 per 90 minutes).

However he also had the most fouls and topped the yellow card charts with 14, six clear of second placed Brian McManus who is a teammate at Shels with Boyd.

The Jack Byrne show

Four time capped Ireland international Jack Byrne missed a chunk of the season due to injury but from his 25 league starts for Shamrock Rovers (and four sub appearances) he topped the charts for:

Assists: 12 - five clear of his teammate Rory Gaffney and of Saints player Chris Forreste

Passes: 66 per 90 minutes (81% accuracy) which was ahead of Patrick McEleney (62 / 82%) and Sadou Diallo (61/88%) although the Derry duo had a higher passing accuracy.

Key passes: 3.7 per 90 minutes ahead of Will Patching (2.1) and Keith Ward (1.8)

Deep completions*: 2.0 per 90 ahead of Derry City’s Brandon Kavanagh (1.9) and Patrick McEleney (1.7)

Passes to final third: 15 per 90 (67% accuracy) with McEleney (13/72%) and Greg Bolger (11.5/59%) second and third on this list

Corners: 6.32 per 90 mins ahead of Will Patching’s 3.7 per 90

Byrne dropped into second place on progressive passes* behind Candystripe player Ciaran Coll who signed on with City for another 12 months over the weekend.

* A deep completion is a pass (excluding a cross) that was received within a 20m radius from the opponent’s goal line while a progressive pass is one that moves the ball considerably forward.

Dribbles and Crosses

Darragh Burns led the way on dribbles with the St. Patrick’s Athletic winger averaging 9.1 per 90 minutes ahead of Liam Burt with 8.4. Burns was third looking at progressive runs (3.1 per 90) behind runner up Barry Cotter (3.8) with Neil Farrugia having the most with 4.7 per 90 minutes.

Kris Twardek topped the crossing charts with 5.1 crosses per 90 minutes

Duels

Derry City’ new signing Colm Whelan won most offensive duels* (18 per 90 mins) while at UCD and James Akintunde, who is Bohs bound from Derry, was second with 16.5. Sean Brennan, who is off to Drogheda United from UCD, won the most defensive duels* (11 per 90).

*An offensive duel is one when the player has possession of the ball with a defensive duel one when an opponent was in possession of the football.

One final stat to fling in here is Ronan Finn topped the throw in charts with 12.5 per 90 minutes.

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— Extratime.com (@ExtratimeNews) December 12, 2022