Football
Anirudh Menon 4y

Ronaldo 19 unbeaten; Kane assists 4; Thiago's record 75: Stats of the weekend

Wow. That was some weekend of football, eh? Goals galore across all of Europe's major leagues means 'BY THE NUMBERS' had its work cut out. Here are the best stats from this weekend's action.


Premier League

Liverpool saw off 10-man Chelsea 2-0, Tottenham Hotspur smashed Southampton 5-2, Arsenal dug in to beat West Ham 2-1 and Crystal Palace swatted aside Manchester United 3-1. Oh, and Leeds United beat Fulham 4-3 and Leicester beat Burnley 4-2. Let's just say there were a lot of goals in England this weekend.

4

Son Heung-Min scored four goals vs Southampton. And Harry Kane assisted ALL of them! This is the first time in the PL era that one player has assisted another four times in a single match.

It's also only the fourth time a player has scored a PL hat-trick with one player assisting each goal: Newell to Shearer vs Coventry, Sep 1995, Collymore to Fowler vs Arsenal, Dec 1995, and Henry to Ljungberg vs Sunderland, May 2003 being the other three.

2

Wilfried Zaha enjoyed his return to Old Trafford. He has become the first ex-Manchester United player to score twice in a PL game against them.

4

This is a rather unexpected stat. Crystal Palace are unbeaten in their last four PL away games against the Manchester clubs (both City and United); the last side to go five such games without defeat were Chelsea between May 2013-October 2014.

4.9

We weren't kidding about 'goals galore'. There were 39 goals scored across eight games this weekend at an average of 4.9 per game; this is the highest goals per game rate on a Saturday + Sunday of PL football (min. five games).

6

Back to that remarkable Spurs-Saints game. Harry Kane is only the sixth player to assist four goals in single PL game (the others -- Dennis Bergkamp, José Antonio Reyes, Cesc Fàbregas, Emmanuel Adebayor, Santi Cazorla, Dusan Tadic). He is the first English player to do so. To put this into perspective, Kane only assisted two league goals in the entirety of last season.

9

Since the PL resumed in June, no player has scored more goals in the competition than Michail Antonio (nine, level with Raheem Sterling).

11

Andreas Christensen is the first player to be sent off in a PL fixture between Chelsea and Liverpool since... Frank Lampard in February 2009, 11 years ago!.

14

Leeds' opening two PL games have seen 14 goals this season (For 7, Against 7), the most for a top-flight side's opening two matches since Wolves in 1962-63 (For 12, Against 2).

15

Carlo Ancelotti has never lost a PL game to a newly promoted club in 15 previous such matches (Wins 11 Draws 4); this is the most any manager has faced promoted sides without ever suffering defeat to one in the competition.

27

Is a revolution truly brewing on Merseyside? This is the first time in 27 years that both Liverpool and Everton have kicked off a PL season with maximum points from their opening two games. The last time, Liverpool were managed by Graeme Souness, and Everton by Howard Kendall.

75

Thiago Alcantara came on in the second half of Liverpool v Chelsea, for his PL debut. He completed more passes (75) in those 45 minutes than any Chelsea player managed in the entire match. Since full passing data is available for the Premier League (2003-04), his 75 successful passes are the most by a player who played a maximum of 45 minutes. Man can play, eh?

87

Since Jurgen Klopp's appointment in October 8, 2015, no other team has won more points vs "Big 6" teams than Liverpool (87 points). His side are tied with Manchester City for the most wins vs such teams during that period (23 wins).

La Liga

Champions Real Madrid got their season underway with an uninspiring 0-0 draw at Real Sociedad. Of course, these are early days -- Barcelona haven't even played - but the league leaders as of this weekend are Granada (who beat Alaves 2-1) and Real Betis (who beat Real Vallodolid 2-0).

4

Real Madrid, yes, Real Madrid are the first team to play a La Liga game with four different players born in 2000 or later. (Vinicius Junior, Rodrygo Goes and debutants Marvin Park and Sergio Arribas).

41

Aged 41 years and 114 days old, Cadiz's Alberto Cifuentes has become the second oldest player to make his debut in La Liga, after Harry Lowe in 1935 (48 years and 226 days). Dreams hath no age, mi amigo.

Bundesliga

Champions Bayern Munich did peak Bayern Munich things as they eviscerated Schalke 8-0. Borussia Dortmund beat Borussia Monchengladbach 3-0 and RB Leipzig beat Mainz 3-1 as the big boys all got off to a good start in the first week of the 2020-21 Bundesliga.

0

This is the first time that Wolfsburg and Bayer Leverkusen have ever played each other to a scoreless draw; In the previous 47 matches, an average of 3.4 goals have been scored per game.

17

Jude Bellingham -- he of the Birmingham-City-retired-his-number fame -- became the youngest Bundesliga player (since detailed data collection started in 2004-05) to assist a goal, at 17 years, and 82 days.

Ronaldo-Messi watch

Lionel Messi and Barcelona are still in pre-season. Cristiano Ronaldo, though, is back to competitive action, and of course, he's back to scoring again. He got the third in Juventus' 3-0 win over Sampdoria, Andrea Pirlo's managerial (competitive) debut.

10

Cristiano Ronaldo had 10 shots in Juventus' 3-0 win against Sampdoria; the most by a player in a single game in Europe's top five leagues this season. He finished the night with a goal and an assist.

19

Ronaldo has now scored in 19 consecutive top-flight seasons. NINETEEEN.

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