What is tackle success? Misleading stat suggests Man Utd midfield are effective tacklers

A lot has been made of Manchester United's season so far under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer as he attempts to juggle what most would consider to be a top heavy squad. The Red Devils boss has added the likes of Jadon Sancho and Cristiano Ronaldo to his ranks, but saw no new recruits to the midfield, despite it being pinpointed as an area of weakness.

Fred and Scott McTominay are the pairing that Solskjaer still trusts, but playing both comes at a cost. It means that, with Ronaldo almost guaranteed a starting berth regardless of his overall performance levels and Bruno Fernandes quite rightly the first name on the teamsheet, some big names have to miss out.

Paul Pogba has been utilised in the double pivot this season, but the most recent league defeat to Leicester highlighted the problems that poses. He's not a player blessed with defensive discipline, and was utterly overrun and outplayed in the middle ground by Youri Tielemans in particular. The Frenchman, who does play the role quite frequently for France - crucially alongside the indefatigable N'Golo Kante - failed to make a single tackle against in the game, was dribbled past three times and committed six fouls.

However, if you were to look at what is known as his 'tackle success' this season, you'd think there was no problem at all. Indeed, Pogba's figure in that regard at this admittedly early stage in the league season stands at an impressive 75 per cent. That ranks among the best of all midfielders in Europe's top five leagues.

At this point it's worth qualifying the fact that such a small sample size has been used as a means of highlighting the struggles of the United midfield at this early stage of the current season in particular.

So what is tackle success?

Labelling many statistics isn't straightforward, but tackle success is certainly among what could be considered the most misleading. It pertains to what are described as tackles won as a percentage of total tackles.

What's important to know is that both categories are positive. A tackle is any attempt to win the ball directly from an opponent that is successful in dispossessing that player, irregardless of where the ball ends up. The result of the tackle is key to the tackles won metric, whereby if the tackler - or a teammate of the tackler - comes away with the ball it is deemed a tackle won.

If the tackle is successfully completed but doesn't result in the tackler coming away with the ball, that is not a tackle won, even if the objective of dispossessing the player on the ball has been achieved. This includes instances such as a tackle by the touchline that goes straight out of play and results in a throw in to the opponents team, for example.

In the case of Paul Pogba this season, when he has made a tackle, he - or a teammate - has emerged with the ball an impressive amount. However, this apparent tackle success isn't inclusive of all tackles attempted. This is where missed tackles come into play, and this consists of two separate statistics. The first is the number of times a player is dribbled past and the second is the number of fouls they concede when attempting to tackle.

What we will call tackle completion rate as opposed to tackle success, then, is the total tackles a player completes as a percentage of the total tackles a player attempts. As such, this is often a much more reliable reflection of how effective a player is at tackling.

It's missed tackles where Pogba, and indeed the majority of his Manchester United midfield counterparts, come unstuck. In a study of the 108 midfield and attacking midfield players to attempt 30 or more tackles at this early stage of the season, the Frenchman boasts the second worst tackle completion rate, at just 23.5 per cent. Moreover, Bruno Fernandes is the fourth worst at 26.7 per cent and Fred ranks 78th with 41.6 per cent.

All are way below the average tackle completion rate of those in the study, which stands at 46.9 per cent, while Scott McTominay has failed to make enough tackles to qualify. All in all, Manchester United's three most used midfielders attempted exactly 100 tackles in total at the time of writing, and completed just 31.

What this highlights as well as the players' individual struggles is perhaps the most consistent criticism levelled at the team under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, that said midfielders are being overrun and too easily countered upon. A lack of press from the attacking players in the line up means it is often all too easy for opponents to spring out and get at the United defence.

That assertion is only strengthened by the fact that as many as three United midfielders have even attempted 30 tackles or more at this stage of the season. That accounts for 11.5 per cent of the entire Premier League representation (26 players), while there isn't a single player from the likes of Manchester City or Liverpool to be seen, with both sides far more adept at pressing high up the pitch.

For context the two players that boast the strongest tackling statistics when taking both tackle completion and tackle success into account both play for the same club. They are Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Oliver Skipp of Tottenham, who are the only two to have outscored the averages of those in the study in both metrics. There is actually a third, on loan in Ligue 1, in the form of teenager Pape Sarr whose parent club is... Tottenham.

So next time you see a player like Pogba with a strong tackle success, don't take it as read that the player in question is an effective tackler.