Scouting Raheem Sterling
A giant scouting report on the newest Arsenal player. Looking at the specifics — best usage, finishing questions, decision-making, what he’ll add, whether he’s lost a step, and a lot more
“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” — a (likely apocryphal) quote attributed to Mark Twain
In All or Nothing, Mikel Arteta recounted his experience with pajara — a Spanish word used to describe the feeling that overcomes cyclists who suddenly lose their ability to cope with a race.
“I had it once at Anfield,” explained Arteta. “Suddenly I could only see red shirts flying around. The game is passing all over me. I cannot react. People are thinking: 'What is he doing?' I cannot do it, emotionally, physically… I cannot cope, everything is going too fast. I only had that feeling in my career once. And it was at Anfield.”
That 2014 loss was an onslaught.
Arriving at the top of the table, Arsenal were down 1-0 in the first minute. By the 21st minute, it was 4-0. The gap could have been even wider amidst a flurry of Gerrard free-kicks and Suarez volleys. Even the misses felt violent.
Arteta was not alone in this feeling. A woozy malaise permeated the performances of the entire team that day, particularly that half. Arsène Wenger decried his team’s “concentration, pace, and defensive stability” — and Arteta himself said that Wenger’s half-time talk was the “angriest I had ever seen him.”
One of the root causes of this pajara was a teenager. As one of the “red shirts flying around,” he was one of the reasons, as Arteta recounted, “everything was going too fast.”
He got behind at will, logging a brace on the day.
Later that year, he’d win the Golden Boy award as the best young male footballer in Europe.
Arsenal finally got on the sheet in the second half when Arteta himself scored from the spot to make it 5-1.
It wouldn’t be the last encounter between Mikel Arteta and Raheem Sterling.
By now, you likely know the broad-strokes of the Raheem Sterling story.
Born in Kingston, Jamaica, he moved to London at the age of five, playing football in the shadow of Wembley Stadium, as a tattoo on his arm depicts. He got some buzz early. As he recounted to the Players’ Tribune:
When I was 10 or 11, I was getting scouted by some big clubs in London. Fulham wanted me. Arsenal wanted me. And when Arsenal want you, of course you’re thinking you gotta go there. Biggest club in London, you know? So I’m running around telling my mates, “I’m off to the Arsenal!”
But my Mum is a proper warrior. She knows how to make it in this world. She’s probably the most streetwise person I know. She sat me down one day, and she said, “Look, I love you. But I don’t feel you should go to Arsenal.”
She convinced him to go to QPR, warning that at Arsenal, “there’s going to be 50 players who are just as good as you.”
His sister led him on the daily trek.
We’d leave at 3:15 and get home at 11 p.m. Every. Single. Day. She’d sit upstairs in the little cafe and chill until I was done with training. Imagine being 17 years old and doing that for your little brother. And I never once heard her say, “Nah, I don’t wanna take him.”
By the age of 15, he was skipping entire stages of the developmental process, and was believed to be on the verge of a first-team call-up. At the time, you could even get a glance of him on Soccer AM doing a skills battle against Christian Nanetti.
The tiny boy learned some durable lessons while darting through bigger, older competition.
“It helped develop his mentality,” said QPR academy chief Steve Gallen. “All through the ranks people tried to smash him. He was so small the bullies thought they could intimidate him. They couldn’t get close. He’d ride tackles. He’d see the fouls coming. And when they did hit him, it never bothered him for an instant. He’d dust himself down and get on with it. What you noticed from the start with him is he’s got no fear at all.”
One of the people who was bewitched by Sterling at the time was Mark Anderson, who also has a connection with another Arsenal player: Benjamin White. When White was released by Southampton at the age of 16, Anderson held the role of Head of Academy Player Recruitment and Talent ID at Brighton, and saw White playing in a friendly.
“What I saw — and it's the very first thing I look for — is the mentality. A good body language, a great character, good preparation, good leadership skills.”
Not a bad eye. White signed for Brighton, and we know the rest.
In a previous role as a scout for Liverpool, Anderson was double-booked, so he sent his brother to watch Sterling against Crystal Palace. His brother sent word that, yes, this is a player who should be on the radar. From there, Anderson saw the 15-year-old Sterling playing two age groups up for QPR, and was convinced.
“He had everything. It was one of those gut feelings.”
With competitors swirling, he was not cheap. The transfer cost a sum of £600,000, with a further £5 million to follow.
The move to Liverpool quickly bore its fruit. He was a star for the youth setup, stubbornly navigating tricky waters against more physically mature competition.
A year into his tenure at Liverpool, he bagged five goals in a Youth Cup win over Southend United — simply looking at a different level to the players in his cohort.
He made his debut as a league starter in 2012 against Manchester City. Since then, he’s accumulated a list of achievements that look disarmingly linear on a Wikipedia page: PFA Young Player of the Year; Golden Boy; the most expensive English player ever; four-time Premier League champion; five-time league cup winner; FA cup winner; a dazzling run in the Euros; FWA Footballer of the Year; and 187 G+A in the Premier League. And oh yeah, an MBE.
Not yet 30, he is already top-20 all-time in league goals. At one point, his Transfermarkt value was €160m.
His true path has been more layered, more complicated, more interesting than those paragraphs would seem to indicate.
His best years, undoubtedly, have come under the tutelage of that player for whom he triggered pajara all those years ago.
And now their paths merge again.
📖 Player overview
We’ll start, as we usually do, on the physical side.
Sterling’s standout physical attribute has always been his quick-burst acceleration, mixed with his agility in tight spaces. His immediate speed has been world-elite throughout his career. It’s served him well in endless snappy runs to the back-post and elsewhere in the box. He’s more of a sprinter than a distance runner, but has proven fast in most scenarios.
About that running style: Liam Tharme tells me it’s an “anterior pelvic tilt,” which is also used by a host of sprinters. Sterling learned the power of DNA:
“My mum went to my little brother's sports day and she sent me a clip of her running and I thought, 'OK, that's where I get it from!'"
“I'd never seen her run before. It's my mum. Don't laugh but yeah. Before she had my sister she was in the Jamaica athletics team when she was young.
“I don't think my running style is something to pass on though, I'll take all the laughter myself.”
Let’s get one of your questions out of the way early. Has he lost a step? The answer, as far as I can tell, is no — or at most, “not really.”
In full disclosure, going into this exercise, I’d assumed he’d slowed down a bit, which would be a fair expectation for a player with his level of mileage. (And he may have a bit less stamina.) But studying his tape from last year, as well as his performances during the preseason tour, though, I didn’t really find any evidence for that. Though February, he had been Chelsea’s fastest player, registering a top speed of 35.53 km/h; that stat can be a little messy and situational, but it’s worth noting because top speed is not necessarily where he shines brightest. Crucially: he just … looks … really … quick.
The other big thing to notice is his strength and balance. This is a way in which he might be misunderstood, due to his short frame and his propensity to go down in the box. He gets really low, expects challenges on his back, rides them, and can fight off larger centre-halves. His time as a false-9 has been helpful in this regard.
Then, he can often use his finessing, quick turns to get by.
In terms of his physical qualities when out-of-possession: he covers ground. He’s often fairly discriminant with his energy usage, and manages his sprints more — finding spots to walk or cheat up in the event of a ball loss. If he initiates contact or a lean, he shows requisite strength to unsettle defenders; if the opponent is braced for impact, or initiates contact themselves, Sterling can have trouble shoving them off. He needs high (i.e., low) ground.
He’s a negative performer in the air, often avoiding battles completely, but has scored 11 goals in his career with his head.
In general, this is a player who has broadly retained most of his physical tools to date. Deterioration can happen quickly — or “gradually, then suddenly” as they say — and with the amount of minutes Sterling has played, and the degree to which he depends on his bursts, it’s definitely something to keep an eye on. He’s at an age where one seemingly random, niggling injury can really derail things. But it hasn’t happened to date.
📖 Statistical overview
Here’s a look at his last three seasons, which includes his last year at Manchester City.
The TL;DR of that section is that his goals and key passes have gone down since joining Chelsea, while his direct take-ons have increased.
Let’s look at some of the deeper analytics, courtesy of StatsBomb.
This is a pretty exciting statistical profile, considering this period was not looked upon with great acclaim.
Some highlights of the last year. He was:
85th percentile for expected goals
99th percentile for on-ball value (OBV) from dribbling and carrying. I have a little hesitation with OBV in general, but hey, this looks like good news
94th percentile for touches in the box
86th for expected goal per shot
The overall passing numbers are less impressive, though he remains 87th percentile for open play xG assisted.
Next, let’s compare him to his likely competitors for game time.
Of note here:
Check out Trossard’s defensive activity. I’ve been really impressed on this front since he’s joined — it feels as though he’s going out of his way to prove himself as an Arteta Man.
Sterling fouls the most out of the group. On tape, he retains that Man City quality of just taking the player down if it seems like a fairly promising counter.
He generated more goals per 90 than either Saka or Martinelli.
He generated the least amount of shots per 90 of the group. If you watch him lately, this makes sense. He’s not crashing as much as he used to.
He dribbles the most frequently out of anyone in the group. We’ll cover that more later, but this is a theme of his time at Chelsea, though not necessarily in his peak years. He’s dribbling more actively, playing more guitar solos, trying to put the team on his back, and is more haphazard as a result.
He leads the group in progressive runs (i.e., he carried the ball significantly more close to the opponent goal).
Like Saka, he gets fouled a lot.
I’ll wrap up with a few numbers from CannonStats (subscribe, will ye). Sterling was:
96th percentile in goal probability added
90th percentile in open play xA
98th percentile in deep touches
Looking pretty good for a last-minute deal.
🏋🏽♂️ Adjustment period
As written by Oliver Kay in the Athletic:
“Equally, there is a danger in judging a player — and it applies to Enzo Fernandez, Mudryk, Sterling and so many others — on his struggles in what has been a dysfunctional environment at Chelsea of late. In a little over two years at Stamford Bridge, Sterling has played for five different managers/head coaches and in a variety of roles, in a variety of systems, with a wide variety of team-mates. It is hardly surprising that, like so many others, he has struggled.”
In theory and on paper, at least, Mauricio Pochettino’s intended style carried a few similarities to what Arteta has instilled at Arsenal.
But we know it’s not the same. At Chelsea, the last two years have been a shitshow. This hasn’t empowered that sense of collective confidence and rhythm that a player typically needs to thrive.
Here’s what he’s been up to in the preseason.
This affects people in different ways. For Jorginho (or somebody like Cole Palmer), the impact has been minimal, because they could have a lot of influence in how the game proceeds, then bend it to their liking. For Havertz, a lot of his overall game remained in tact, but as he was dependent on the vision of others, he’d question the timing of his runs and his final actions. For Mount (in 22/23), a confusion crept in, to my eye; he had far less confidence about where his teammates would be, and his passing suffered as a result.
Sterling felt the most like Havertz, with a touch of Mount sprinkled in. The underlying player was clearly there, as the numbers demonstrated, and the qualities that made him great have not evaporated. But the environment took its toll. The more Sterling showed his skill directly, the more things could feel a little forced — then, in final actions, that sense of mind-meld that he developed with KDB and others never really reappeared at Chelsea.
He got caught between identities. One is the Main Man, a superstar signed to signal the beginning of a new project; the other is the player from his peak years, when he thrived on association, and became a Main Main as an output (not an input). If that makes sense.
I don’t doubt that some of that second-guessing and awkwardness will take a little bit of time to wash out.
But he has an advantage that Havertz did not: he’s played for Arteta before.
🧾 Showing my work
Studying a player like Sterling is interesting because there are all kinds of things you think you know, but really have to be interrogated; you may just have some vague assumptions, memories, narratives, and gut feelings bouncing around. It’s almost tricker than some player in Norway that you’ve never heard of.
For this newsletter, I wanted to focus on his time at Chelsea so I could get the best grip possible on the player he is today. As such, I watched or rewatched Sterling’s games with Chelsea in the last two years against Bournemouth (2x), Newcastle, Wolves, Fulham, Arsenal, Everton, and Manchester City. Then, I watched some old games against Liverpool (2018) and Bournemouth (2017). I watched every goal he’s scored in the Champions League, Premier League, and for England. Then I created a playlist of a hundred of his dribbles, duels, losses, shots, box movement. Then, some comps.
What follows is still an incomplete picture, but here’s what I found.
🧠 Playing temperament
Throughout his career, Sterling has brought a real thrust to the proceedings, especially in attack — I’ve seen people call it a “quiet ambition.” He is constantly darting around, engaged, trying to make things happen.
This Pep quote made me laugh.
“He realises how funny it is to score goals, how good it is.”
He is expansive and brainy with his positional nous. Like Zinchenko and Jesus before him, he is not just painting by numbers in a positional system — he is making the canvas his own. His sense of timing and anticipation could reasonably described as among the world’s best, especially during his peak years.
He has the eye-catching skills of a team’s primary on-ball threat, but sometimes that role can magnify his weaknesses (overdribbling, bouts with slop) and dull his strengths. He probably looks best when the opponent loses track of where he is, and it’s usually easy to spot the guy with the ball. That role was clearest at Manchester City.
I thought this 2016 quote from his former QPR teammate Richard Amofa can help add context to the last couple of years.
“I think his playing style suits playing with better players," Amofa opined. "At Liverpool he got that, compared to QPR. You could see he learned so much from playing with Suarez. You could see he became more disciplined. Watch him now —he’s a real team player.
It’s not all straightforward. He has a natural sense of flow, and when that was disrupted, he had periods of serious inconsistency. He describes himself as “really stubborn,” and is not blessed with a blind trust for authority. Can relate.
“He’d listen,” said Gallen. “But it depended who was telling him. I discovered with Raheem you have to earn his trust. If you hammer him, he doesn’t listen. Yes, you could tell him off, but it would only really make a difference to his attitude if he trusted the person telling him off.”
In The Pep Revolution, journalist Marti Perarnau described eyewitness accounts of “furious exchanges” between Sterling and Pep.
Like most great players, he wants to play, and is liable to be cranky otherwise. (Trossard, amirite?). I imagine he is going into this situation with open eyes — it’s reported that he rejected a £650,000-a-week offer from Saudi Arabia to stay in London — and his relationship with Arteta should go a long way. But settling in as a rotational player can be hard for a player who has reached such heights.
Arteta sounds optimistic.
“First of all, because he’s got a big smile on his face, a lot of energy, he’s at it and wants to prove a point. When someone’s got that in his belly, you sense it straight away. Obviously I don’t need to discover anything about his quality and what he can bring to the team.”
Another good sign is that I thought his effort in the preseason looked top-notch.
Let’s get into his game.
In-possession
👉 1v1s, dribbling, and carrying
Sterling’s close control, wiggly agility, and explosive drives are standout characteristics. The “how” and “when” and “why” of his deployment of these skills is important.
Since joining Chelsea, he has become an increasingly high-volume dribbler. Last year, he attempted the highest volume of dribbles in his career (6.0 per 90) and the most progressive carries of his career (5.45 per 90). His play-style was more like his time at Liverpool.
There is a trade-off to this: his dribbling success has dropped from 52.5% at Manchester City to 37.3% at Chelsea, and he posted the lowest success rate of his career last year. Now, we shouldn’t care too much about dribbling percentage in a vacuum. It’s always about what you’re doing and why. Vini, for example, is a career 42.8% dribbler. But there’s something there.
He looks best to me when unleashing himself on a winding carry through the middle. He’s comfortable in traffic, can ride little challenges and change directions in an instant — and at speed.
Here’s another example, which leads to him releasing Kai.
It’s in these pockets on the left that his turns and ability to slide-and-glide look most dangerous. The unique thing is that he can perform all of his skills — shifts, twists, take-ons — at full-speed.
Out wide, he is still plenty capable, and can most definitely still beat his man, as you saw in the first clip. But I feel he can be more proactive than reactive; that may not sound like much of a diss, but when you’re downhill on a full-back, you don’t always want to originate the move. You want to monitor your opponent for slight leans, commitments, and balance issues, and then exploit that. Out wide at Chelsea, he has preordained moves, gotten tunnel vision, and dribbled himself into many a cul-de-sac. This leads to off-games where he’s trying to force it.
…or there can be simple moments of “meh.”
He’s best out there when he’s actively surveying the full-back. The second they shift weight, he can hit it into space and sprint right by them. He also does a lot of fun dribbles and moves down the byline.
Interestingly, Sterling recounted earlier his transformation when he was still with Man City.
“I try to do less of what I did when I was younger. Every time I had the ball I had to put on a show or beat someone. Now I wait for an actual moment.
You have got to save your energy for in and around the goal.”
At Chelsea, he often reverted to type.
As far as losses go, I expected this to be an area of concern, but it was not really the case statistically last year. He had 23 total losses in the Chelsea third (passes or duels lost) and his “loss index” — which basically crudely measures how much attacking impact you have versus the amount of times you lose the ball — is among the lowest (i.e. best) in the league.
His style is a little different on the left and right, but he looks equally comfortable on either side as a pure dribbler, which isn’t always common.
He also, of course, draws a lot of fouls and pens. From Opta, here are the most penalties won in Premier League history:
Raheem Sterling: 26
Jamie Vardy: 23
Wilfried Zaha: 19
Alan Shearer: 15
Danny Welbeck: 14
Andrew Johnson: 14
Gabriel Agbonlahor: 13
Emile Heskey: 13
Ashley Young: 13
Mohamed Salah: 13
Luis Suárez: 13
👉 Movement / off-ball runs
Sterling is one of the best off-ball movers of the era. His elite acceleration combines with a very nuanced feeling for angles, manipulation, and timing to form a special package.
“If you talk to defenders, he’s one of the players you’d hate to play against every game,” said former City forward Darius Vassell. “He brings so much to the table. He can also play in any of the front three positions and can move around which is a nightmare for defenders.”
Sterling owes much of this to his detailed work with Arteta. These efforts are well-chronicled in Pep’s City, a book by Pol Ballús and Lu Martín.
“We wanted him much closer to the penalty area,” said Arteta. “It was like he was a bit scared of the goal. We wanted him to become the kind of player who would get us a goal every game, or even just missing two or three big chances. We wanted him constantly generating goal threat. And we wanted him to lose the fear. He needed to believe in himself, to believe that he could be the best.”
The throwaway line that Arteta was content with the player “just missing two or three big chances” hints at a clear mind for observing a player’s impact. Many fans would tell you that Sterling took it too literally.
The book offered more detail about these efforts.
The plan was that Sterling should make a habit of dropping slightly further away from his marker, or nearest opponent, when looking to receive possession, his body turned towards the goal. In that position, if he then gunned his extraordinary accelerator, the sprint was always to the danger area.
Arteta: “If he’s found a space about three metres off his defender but he’s half-turned towards the goal then his sprint takes him much more quickly to a space where he can shoot and that’s going to cause the rival much more damage. It’s also a tactic, dropping off a little, so that your defender gets drawn into a position he mightn’t want to be in. It leaves space behind him and Raheem can attack that space. If it’s close to, or in the penalty area, they also have to hesitate before putting in a challenge.”
You can see this concept of “dropping off a little” throughout his goal involvements.
Below, a switch is hit out to Gabriel Jesus on the left-wing. Sterling is on the right, but is incredibly patient about his arrival. He is waiting, waiting, waiting until the moment of impact. As soon as the defenders are preoccupied by the ball, he turns on the afterburners and arrives right on time.
That one’s a good example of a quote that goes around a lot from Juanma Lillo, Pep’s assistant, and a highly-experienced (and interesting) coach in his own right.
Because teams try to play as far as they can from their own goal, when they break through the opponent’s defensive line they’re going so quickly that the players in the middle go ahead of the one who has the ball out wide. I used to say in Manchester that the last player to arrive to the box is the first one to be able to shoot. I tell that to my strikers all the time: the closer you get to the goal, the further you are from scoring.
You can see that patience happen here, in Sterling’s goal against Croatia in the Euros. He waits until he’s fully in the blind spot of the defender. Then, as soon as Phillips is ready to pass, he darts out and nobody can keep up with him. Goal.
A lot of times it’s more straightforward. This wide-angle gives you a good look at how he stays wide in the blindspot, allowing his teammates to occupy defenders — then waits for that famous KDB overlap cross, and turns it on.
Here, when Havertz floated out wide from the #9, Sterling took his spot. The underlap cross hit him right on the foot and he found the exact angle to receive.
These moments, particularly in transition, have been more likely to be awkward at Chelsea.
👉 1-2s
In conjunction with his off-ball work, a key weapon for Sterling is the use of the 1-2. Not much to say here: he dishes it and beats you behind on quickness.
Here’s him driving into space and megging our new keeper for the goal.
For Arsenal’s sake, all this movement is promising when considering the team’s struggles to break down some stubborn mid-blocks last year.
This, essentially, is how you do it.
Those simple shovels are where Merino thrives.
I expect that pairing to like one another.
👉 Passing and receiving (small, association)
Sterling is a skilled receiver. He has some technical inconsistencies elsewhere, but his first touch usually kills the ball dead — which helped him receive almost 14 progressive passes per match at Man City. His close control serves him well from there.
His ability to drop in central areas, fight off challenges, and do rapid link-up makes him an actual false-9 option, though that may be rare. Look at this.
We’ll get to his key passing in the next section. Similarly, his intermediate passing game is more mixed. The normal stuff is good. The issues are less due to pure technical skill, or a lack of ball-striking, and more to do with inconsistent decision-making. It’s hard to explain past “he does random shit sometimes.”
On that one: I’ve found he’s more likely to lose the ball on the deep-left than the deep-right.
Fundamentally, I think he’d still like to be the player who ran riot in the Liverpool youth system, doing anything he pleased and scoring goals for fun — but the Premier League is a hard religion, and his mind gets caught in-between being the new perfectly-trained associator and the former greed-is-good match dominator.
Something really nice is the quick little flicks in crowded spaces. There are plenty of these on tape.
He does not typically take corners. He had 0 for Chelsea last year, 7 the year before, and 28 total for Man City.
👉 Crosses & key passes
Sterling can hit a ball, but he doesn’t bombard the box with typical wide crosses. This is especially true from the left, where he often plays more inside, and usually opts for simple popped crosses into the box, rather than more dangerous power-hits. Really good ones are not beyond him, however.
His 2.68 crosses per 90 are good for 54th percentile, and his 1.59 passes into the pen are good for 63rd. He likes quick, rondo-ish passing sequences around the box, rotating freely with those around him.
In terms of key passes, his decision-making can be quizzical — but through sheer force of will (and volume), he usually racks up the numbers anyway.
Prepare yourself. There will be probably be a few moments where you’d like to pull your hair out.
He has an uncanny ability to generate a hugely net-positive impact on a club — the ratio isn’t close — but to also leave you with a few clunky moments that stick long in your memory; these can often be the result of indecision. This is partially the nature of somebody who puts themselves in good positions, but yeah, it’s also part of the cake with Sterling. The public is bad at weighting such things.
There is one big thing to note, though. It’s the primary way his game changes from the left to the right, and something we’ve talked about a lot lately: the deep cross.
As you’ll see, it was the big way he generated assists last year.
It’s simple. He can beat you to the byline and hammer in a quick cross. If you have a good box-crasher in there, they will cash in. Watch Palmer come alive immediately.
You can vaguely see it here, too, in a link-up between Jorginho (👋), Mount (once a target), Sterling (👋), and Havertz (👋).
If they hadn’t played together before, I’d say I was awfully optimistic about the Sterling/Havertz dynamic, perhaps even as a strike partnership on top. In reality, they played together for a year, and it didn’t result in a lot of shared goal involvements. I don’t have the best beat on why that is. Maybe it’s the amount of dysfunction in that Chelsea year; maybe they just didn’t click.
👉 LW or RW
While we’re here, we can discuss some of the differences between Sterling playing on the left versus the right.
I pulled all the data, and the overall numbers are laughably similar — with one exception.
He has almost three times the assists from the right side.
This is because of the deep crosses we’ve mentioned.
👉 Ball-striking
Sterling is a generally a good finisher and ball-striker.
(ducks)
Hear me out.
First, I’ll use the data. Since 2017-2018, when xG data got added to fbref and the like, Sterling has 92 goals on 85.8 xG — which is good for an “overperformance” of +6.2 goals. There are all kinds of influences to that number, but over a seven-year sample, that does not point to the disastrous finisher we see portrayed on social media. His finishing performance does look correlated to the Arteta Years.
Over a different period (2020-present), Sterling offers some of the highest-quality shots in the league, as seen in this chart by the great @wt_analysis. He’s not only taking a lot of good shots, he’s added ~20% of quality on average through his ball-striking in this time, which is top-10 in the league for right-footers (after Rice, Trossard, KDB, Rodri and some others).
That’s over a period that is largely seen as disappointing.
He’s scored from a free kick, which is more than Arsenal can say for the last 3+ years (not that we try very often).
He has a few worldies in his portfolio. His time with Gerrard and Suarez sunk in.
…and he even has a few at Chelsea. Here was his first goal for the club.
That looked oddly like one he hit against Southampton in the last minute in 2017.
…and here’s one that’s a little more common. The kind of cut-in that could mirror Saka’s finishes on the other side. As one may expect, he’s able to get more shots off the left.
So what gives?
His technique isn’t as reliable as other players of his quality, and there’s some composure stuff mixed in. His problem isn’t that he misses. It’s that he misses big and memorable. It’s birdie, par, birdie, birdie, par, par, triple bogey.
Oof.
Will there be a couple of these at Arsenal this year? Probably. It’s all about keeping it proportion.
(I’d also keep him off penalties.)
👉 Out-of-possession
Something I’ve liked about his preseason performances was that, in an uncertain situation, he showed a lot of energy and application in the out-of-possession side. His stamina and energy have been great.
If he can get leverage, and get his backside into the player to shield the ball away, he can usually push off bigger players — like he did with Rice here.
At Chelsea, he could definitely be found managing his energy, walking when the ball is on the other side, or tracking back late; part of me thinks Martinelli needs to do that a bit more. At Chelsea, I saw him effort and engagement occasionally wane as a result of game-state frustrations.
Sometimes, Sterling used that to his advantage with blind-side rips.
He’s extremely well-versed in the basics of a modern press and knows where and when to be.
In aerials, he’s a non-factor.
🚑 Injuries and availability
The concern with Sterling is not his injury history — he’s proven durable throughout his career — it’s the amount of minutes he’s logged. As written in the Athletic:
He has also played a huge amount of football since becoming a first-team regular at Liverpool shortly after his 17th birthday: 549 appearances at club level, plus another 82 for England. That is an awful lot of miles on the clock. He had looked a certainty to win 100 caps but has not won his place back since their elimination from the 2022 World Cup. He would not be the first early-starter to find his career in decline in his late twenties.
🤔 Positions, positions
I’d wager that it’s most likely that Sterling gains his primary share of minutes at left-wing.
It’s definitely conceivable that he makes the starting job primarily his, particularly against specific kinds of blocks. If so, you’ll want to free up his access to the middle. Whereas Havertz-as-LCM often serves as a shadow striker, you may want to push up Calafiori and Zinchenko more so that Sterling can get inside, which would bring Merino down into the midfield.
Some configurations could look like this — with the LB holding width, the LW (Jesus here) in the half-space, and the midfield controlled by midfielders.
Elsewhere:
Sterling is just about the most capable right-wing depth Arsenal could imagine for Saka. He has gravity, he has 1v1 ability, he can playmake, he can run in behind, and I think he’ll have a good relationship with the captain.
His experience has a false-nine is not trivial. He’s played there for 2451 Premier League minutes, and I have him down for double that if you include other competitions and friendlies. I’d still personally have him fourth on the team sheet there, behind Havertz, Jesus, and Trossard — and roughly even with Martinelli. But I wouldn’t rule out interesting developments there, and I’d like to see a Havertz strike partnership at some point.
He could be emergency depth in the high-10 position.
🔥 Final thoughts
Time to wrap it up.
🐻 Bear case
The age and minutes catch up with him. He loses a step, battles knocks and fitness concerns, and his decision-making proves erratic. Without playing time to get in a rhythm, his frustrations are known. Saka stays overburdened. Arsenal regret not signing a younger forward. Jesus, Havertz, and Sterling have too many misses. The opportunity cost, and the wish that Arsenal went bigger this summer, loom over everything.
🐮 Bull case
I’ll start by saying that the risk profile of this move is almost preposterously low — which is why the “bear case” section was so short. The shorter version of that bear case: he’s a bust, but Chelsea covered most of his wages, and Arsenal have to make do with what they had anyway, and there’s no long-term impact. Ahhh!
Think of that difference in expectations of the player:
Huge-wage player expected to be the primary mover of a struggling project
Highly-affordable player expected to rotate and contribute as necessary
The bull case is clear. Upon reuniting with his old coach, Sterling indeed comes back hungry, and rediscovers his best form — all while adding mature little details to his game. He finds a happy medium between the best runs of form in his career — dribbler, creator, in-behind threat — and turns into a serious difference-maker.
Most specifically, he proves exactly the kind of player Arsenal have lacked against mid-blocks. His runs, pace, and ability to drag defenders give Arsenal a new option against packed middles, and his appetite for risk, particularly through the central zone, is a welcome sight. A new layer of dynamism is added, goals pour in, and Sterling is motivated to capture one of the only accolades which has evaded him thus far: the Champions League. His veteran leadership, and his experience winning trophies, demonstrates the level necessary.
There’s also Saka. Sterling proves a vital rotation option, giving Saka an extra 15 minutes frequently and capably filling in when fitness is questionable. Suddenly, a Saka outage isn’t so catastrophic. (Though let’s not test that, thank you.)
After last season, we laid out five objectives to improve Arsenal:
Improve Arsenal’s Plan B through the left side 🔥
Increase risk tolerance in the middle 🔥
Boost team speed 🔥
Add ball-striking
A few more big passes
It’s fair to say that significant progress has been made across all five (save, perhaps, ‘a few more big passes’). Sterling plays his role: improving the left, increasing risk tolerance, and boosting team speed.
Last time we spoke, I was pretty measured in my evaluation of Neto, our new backup goalkeeper. I may be underselling how I felt about Sterling after my study: I was really excited by what I saw on tape. Expectations, cost, and environment got fucky — but there’s still a player in there, and he has the qualities we lack. I am without illusions about his age or inconsistent form. If it doesn’t work out, it’s basically fine. But the upside is considerable.
But more than that, it’s just the goals. Arsenal need more of them, and Sterling has historically gotten ‘em.
He and Saka have done it before.
…and here was Sterling at his best, showing so many of his skills in a single play: the propulsion, the control, the quick interplay, the ghosting, the tap-in.
Twenty years ago, the precocious youngster was overjoyed at the prospect of joining Arsenal.
Biggest club in London, you know? So I’m running around telling my mates, “I’m off to the Arsenal!”
Arteta recounted the conversation that made this deal a reality:
His first words to me were, “Please, I was dreaming of that call.” That’s it.
Now, thanks to all the factors in play — that future coach he discombobulated at Anfield back in 2014, the Chelsea reality show, the support of so many, fate, happenstance, timing, and most of all, himself — he is, at last, off to the Arsenal.
This signing has a very Buffet/Munger vibe to it.
1) Buy fundamentally good assets at cheap prices.
2) Profit.
Great analysis as always Billy, thanks for doing this 🙏
Thanks Billy, great read.
I do however hope you’re wrong about him getting the most minutes on the left, Saka needs the occasional rest and Trossard and Martinelli position battle is healthy.