We were strong in that position yes. But Jacks added something else. no bad things to say about Mahrez , Sterling or Jesus but Grealish creates more and is more of a threat. I understand now why he gets so many fouls he’s a player you can’t stop when in full flight against Leipzig he had their fullback every time. Against Arsenal they doubled up on him and he still was a threat. His dribbling and how he effortlessly glides past players is why he is so dangerous. He gets you out of your seat because you know as soon as he has the ball something will happen. He’s been our best player by far this season so far. him and Phil together will be special to watch. From watching him so far there are striking resemblances to Hazard at Chelsea. the goal in the champions league was Hazard esque.
he’s created the most chances in the prem last season for Villa. He’s now on course to do that again. He’s created the most chances out of everyone in the City team. So far this season with KDB out he has been our major creative threat.
Most of that marries up to the post I agreed with that essentially said his game has been good up until his final ball/decision making. I don't think he's been our best player, one of the better ones definitely but not best. there's several that have been better, Jesus has been better and more productive on the opposite flank to name but one.
You say he's top of the chance created charts, what does that actually mean? What constitutes a chance created? And who decides what is and isn't a chance? What separates a chance from a half chance, from a chance out of nothing?
One of our best chances in the game was when sterling played the ball to jesus who put in a good delivery and Bernardo slid in and just missed it. I'm not criticising any of that, it was good play all round and just unfortunate. I'm assuming that's going down as a Jesus chance created in these stat books, the reality of that situation though is the ball wasnt quite good enough from jesus and that's the reason why we didn't score that specific chance. Other then the sterling opportunity I mentioned previously which was a chance created by grealish but not one that sterling should definitely score from, I don't remember any others he created. Someone else has quoted me claiming two of Grealish's best created chances were a good cross to the front and back post that nobody attacked, I don't recall that happening in all honesty but from that description if nobody has attacked it, he's crossed it to nobody and like the Jesus chance, its the delivery that's stopped us scoring yet that's recorded favourably as a chance he's created.
Is every chance created given equal weight? If he passes a simple ball 3 yards forward inside the centre back to say sterling who then dribbles past 4 players and slots it in, has he created that chance? Assuming he has, is that kind of chance being recorded equally as if he himself were to dribble past 4 players and give sterling an open net?
The stat is meaningless. There's no clear definition of a chance created and they're useless without in depth context. There's an influx of these americanised stats in the game that are typically just for social media fans to quote as proof to back up whatever they want to spout. Just to clarify because I know somebody will suggest otherwise, I'm not having a go at Grealish here, I'm just questioning the legitimacy of the stat and all the similar ones constantly thrown around.