Stats company show how impressive Tottenham defender is
By Tom Vinall
At the end of last week, renowned stats company Squawka compiled a series of tweets showing just how good Tottenham central defender Cristian Romero is.
The Squawka comparison matrix compares the following 9 traits; Passing accuracy, forward passes, aerial duels won, aerial duel success %, ground duels won, ground duel success %, clearances, interceptions, and ball recoveries. All per 90.
They challenged their 1.2m followers to find a defender that could beat Liverpool captain Virgil Van Dijk statistically. He crushed several players, including Ronald Araujo, Riccardo Calafiori and William Saliba, among others.
Nobody could beat him until Cristian Romero popped up. Who won the statistical battle 6-3, winning all the 9 aforementioned battles aside from aerial duels won, aerial duel success %, and clearances? Worth noting that Van Dijk is 6'4, too.
Several players were used to challenge Romero, including the likes of Thiago Silva, Antonio Rudiger, and partner Micky Van De Ven, but the Argentine defender came out on top vs everyone.
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Stats company show how impressive Tottenham defender is
Of course, stats don't always tell the whole story, and context is always important. But it is nice to see that the numbers back up the eye test that Romero is an elite defender who belongs in conversations with the best of the best.
One of the criticisms aimed at Romero is that he is "reckless" and a "walking card". This is a myth. Since the red card at home to Chelsea, the Spurs number 17 has only picked up two yellow cards, and no red cards.
The Spurs and Argentina defender picked up zero cards in five games at the Copa America, despite averaging 4.8 tackles a game. He was being his aggressive, intense best, but without any recklessness involved, and was able to be a huge positive to his team en route to retaining their Copa America title.
Romero's stock feels like it has never been higher, especially after the Copa America success that he played a huge part in. The 26-year-old is one of the best defenders in the world. Spurs fans know it, Argentina fans know it, and now it is time for the rest of the football world to know it.
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