If Nunez was a pure 9 why has he got such a good assist rate ?
Also like I’ve stated his played 1/3 of his games at LW just like Luis Diaz does.
If his the lowest in SCA why is he the second highest in GCA?
Not like our LW has an xA of 10, his bang on for his assists.
Nunez played one game as LW in the league this season . Get your facts straight. And pure 9s can have a decent amount of assists too. If you play high up the pitch and your team has another goal outlet (in this case, Salah), you'll get assists.
5/8 of his assists are to Salah, all of them basic passes in the final third. Also 2/8 are heading flicks from corners. That simply comes as a result of playing most of your game near your opponents' goal + your team has another finisher. The "creativity" of Nunez is often blown out of proportion due to his assists but it's not like he was dropping deep spraying passes across the pitch and threading throughballs all over the place like a Harry Kane or a Robin van Persie.
And that also explains why he's 11th in the team in SCA90 but 3rd in GCA90 (third, not second), because surely the average distance to the goal of shots is much longer than that of goals. Need more clarifications? Here it goes:
- In SCA90, he's behind Diaz, Trent, Salah, Szobo, Robbo, Elliott, Tsimikas, Macca, Jota, Gakpo. Notice how all our creative outlets, who are involved in the build up phase, are ahead of him?
- In GCA90, he's behind Jota and Salah, and ahead of Gakpo, Macca, Elliott, Bradley, Diaz, Trent, Szobo, Robbo. Notice how the two at the top are also our two best goal outlets?
Side note: Diaz should be in the top 5 in GCA90 too (the top 4 are literally our other 4 forwards, including even Gakpo who played in midfield at times), but he isn't. This is where the criticism about his end products becomes valid.
But the above also means Nunez being higher than Diaz in end products is not much of a thing to brag about. You're better than someone who's struggling badly for end products, while he also absolutely murders you in all the other categories related to possession, build up, and defending.
In a sense, you can say Diaz is Mane without the end products, and Nunez is Mane without the general play. Just shows how monstrous a player Mane was for us.