Official:Stats prove Eden Hazard to be Europe’s best dribbler

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There are so many superb dribblers in European football right now that it’s difficult to distinguish the best of the best. That is, at least, until now. It’s all well and good looking to beat a man at any opportunity after all, only to turnover possession and frustrate the fans in the process. Then there are those that can hold off opponents with ease but are more cautious with their approach and only look to attempt dribble when a pass is not on. We at WhoScored.com, then, have compiled a select group of players based on the frequency of their successful dribbles and then assessed them in terms of overall success rate to decipher which has the best combination of both. To narrow our search down, only the 37 players to have started at least ten games across Europe’s top five leagues and completed a dribble under 30 minutes on average have been analysed. Plotting the frequency (minutes per successful dribble) against success rate (percentage of dribbles attempted that were successful), we separated the players into four categories using the average figures of those in the study*. Therefore, it should be said that every player on the chart is present because they complete a dribble very often, but some do so with far greater efficiency than others. *The average dribble success rate of the 37 players was 64.6%, while the average frequency was a successful dribble every 24.9 minutes.

Those below the average for both success and frequency are highlighted in the bottom left of the above graph, while those above the average in both categories are in the top right, and so on.

The chart shows that only seven of the 37 players are performing above both averages, with some very predictable names cropping up. Less predictable, perhaps, is the appearance of the likes of West Ham’s Arthur Masuaku (frequency = 21 mins / success = 67%), Lyon midfielder Tanguy NDombele (frequency = 24.5 mins / success = 75.6%) and Atalanta playmaker Alejandro Gomez (frequency = 24.1 mins / success = 72%).

The elite four, however, are Lionel Messi, Douglas Costa, Neymar and Eden Hazard, and it’s the latter that appears closest to that top right corner of supremacy than any other.

While Neymar unsurprisingly boasts the fewest minutes per successful dribble in Europe’s top five leagues, completing one every 12.4 minutes, 14 of the players analysed have done so with greater efficiency in terms of success rate (67.6%). 

Tottenham’s Mousa Dembele is way out in front in that regard (shown in the very bottom right of the chart), with a remarkable 91.7% success rate, but only one player in the study - Manchester United’s Paul Pogba - completes a dribble less often (every 29.6 mins).

Hazard, meanwhile, ranks second out of 37 in both categories. It’s statistical proof that when it comes to rounding an opponent with great regularity (every 14.1 mins) and overall success rate (80.4%), the Chelsea star has the best blend in the business.