Fantasy Assists – Are we overlooking them?

I decided to use the FA Cup weekend to take a look at Fantasy assists. In this article I’ll find out how significant they are and if there’s an opportunity for managers to steal a march on their rivals.  

What is a Fantasy Assist? 

To summarise Opta’s event definitions, there are the following types of Fantasy assists: 

• Heavily deflected pass or cross
• Rebound scored from Shot on Target, Shot Blocked, Shot Hit Woodwork. 
• Penalty or Free Kick Won 
• Instigating an Own Goal

These are fairly self-explanatory, the only one that I think could be slightly clearer is ‘Heavily deflected pass or cross‘.

Below is an example of a goal from last season where the assist was given as a Fantasy assist rather than an actual assist: Trent Alexander-Arnold’s cross is deflected by Willy Boly and scored by Sadio Mane. 

Whilst not a particularly heavy deflection it is significant. Consider Opta’s rule on assists:

The initiator is only given a goal assist if the receiving player was likely to receive the ball without the deflection having taken place.

– Opta

Perhaps a better wording would be a ‘Significantly deflected pass or cross‘. Either way the distinction is not that important to us as Fantasy managers – the result is still three points – but it helps give context to the number of Fantasy assists awarded.

As a slight tangent, it’s interesting to note that a ‘Shot Blocked’ must be from an attempt on target but is not counted as a ‘Shot on Target’. 

Shots blocked by another player, who is not the last-man, are not counted as shots on target.

– Opta

Therefore if you want the total number of shots on target you must add together ‘Shots on Target’ and ‘Shots Blocked’.

EDIT: ‘Total Shots On Target‘ is now an option for FFS Members to include when creating custom stats tables.

How significant are Fantasy Assists? 

The table below shows the number of assists and Fantasy assists awarded over the season so far and the previous six years. 

Across the whole period there have been 4,686 assists and 1,326 Fantasy assists.

Fantasy assists add an extra 28% on top of the standard Opta-defined assists or, put another way, Fantasy assists make up 22% of the total assists. Fairly significant.

Breakdown of Fantasy Assists Awarded this Season

Below is a list of the players who have earned more than one Fantasy assist in the current season. A video link to each Fantasy assist is given where possible.

Of the 40 Fantasy assists in the table, 18 result from fouls, 12 from shots, and 10 from a pass or cross. 

Fantasy assists from a pass or cross are not especially relevant – we already look at crossing and chance creation stats when gauging assist potential. So players such as Kevin De Bruyne, Trent Alexander-Arnold, and James Maddison are not being overlooked.

Shots are a little different. We often refer to shots when thinking about goal scoring not assisting. However, in this small sample, 30% of Fantasy assists stem from a shot. Perhaps players who take loads of shots should have their assist potential boosted slightly.

The majority of Fantasy assists (45%) in this small sample derive from fouls. Players who win fouls stand a chance of earning a Fantasy assist from a penalty or free-kick scored.

In short, Fantasy assists mainly benefit players who shoot a lot and win a high number of fouls.

Players Who Benefit from Fantasy Assists

Let’s start by taking a look at the players who take the most shots.

It’s a tad surprising that neither Jimenez nor Salah have a Fantasy assist. They certainly have the potential: both players have a high number of shots on target and shots blocked.

Last season Salah was top for shots (137) and gained four Fantasy assists while Jimenez was fourth and mustered three Fantasy assists. This would suggest both players should benefit again this campaign.

Zaha and Traore standout as the players with the most dribbles although it’s interesting that Jack Grealish has won a higher number of fouls despite making far fewer dribbles.

Last season Zaha was second only to Hazard for fouls won (102 v 104) and picked up six Fantasy assists. Hazard, in contrast, didn’t get a single Fantasy assist but he was of course taking penalties for Chelsea.

Penalty and free-kick takers are the beneficiaries of players who win a lot of fouls. Milivojevic dispatched ten spot-kicks last season and seven the year before. And Maddison scored an impressive three times from direct free-kicks in 2018/19.

Richarlison too has posted eye-catching numbers in previous campaigns. Last year he won 73 fouls and notched two Fantasy assists, and previously at Watford he recorded a league-high 95 fouls won and collected four Fantasy assists.

Drop in Sterling

Over the past three seasons no player has delivered more Fantasy assists than Raheem Sterling. So what’s gone wrong this year?

He’s dribbling less and shooting more compared to last season: 20.3min v 17.2min per dribble and 27.6min v 36.1min per shot. And he’s already had more Big Chances in 2019/20 than he did in the entirety of the previous campaign: 21 v 20.  

Although the underlying data isn’t that different to his 2017/18 season when he averaged a dribble once every 19.5min and a shot every 29.8min.

Digging a little deeper it’s noticeable that his playing position has shifted in the past four seasons from the right to the left. 

Perhaps as a consequence of this positional change he’s had more Blocked Shots (26) this season than in any other campaign, and we still have 14 Gameweeks to go.

With Leroy Sane expected to return in February, could that see Sterling move to the opposite wing?

Fantasy Assist Potential

Often the discussion around assists focuses on Opta assists only and ignores a significant chunk (22%) of the total assists. Players who benefit from Fantasy assists tend to be those who shoot more and win fouls. I think it would be worthwhile to consider these metrics when looking at assist potential.

To help FFS members I’ve created a table with several key statistics for Fantasy Assist Potential. I hope you find it a useful tool for identifying players who could give you an edge over your rivals.