In which professional football competition do we run the most?
This is the question that the CIES Football Observatory tried to answer several weeks ago.
With the help of a partner - SkillCorner who provided them with the race data - the research group was able to study 7,855 matches played during the 2020 or 2020-2021 seasons "
in 31 leagues spread between Europe and America
" to establish a report.
The published results are both very interesting and surprising.
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La Liga in the lead ...
On average, a field player covers 10 kilometers per game, for a total of 100 kilometers per team, excluding the goalkeeper. Football enthusiasts were no doubt expecting to find the Premier League or the Bundesliga - two championships recognized for the intensity and pace of their matches - at the top of the ranking of the competitions in which the teams cover the most distance . But unexpectedly the first British and German divisions are quite far from the first place held by ... La Liga. With an average of 103.7 kilometers per team, the Spanish elite are just ahead of the Allsvenskan (Sweden, 103.6 km) and the Eredivisie (Netherlands, 103.5 km). The Premier League is only in 11th place (100,8 km) - behind in particular the MLS or the Super League - while the Bundesliga is a little further, in 17th place (100 km).
... Ligue 1 far behind
The two major European competitions are above average.
The Champions League is in 7th position with an average of 101.9 kilometers covered by field players "
per match and team
";
the Europa League is in its wake with 101.1 kilometers completed.
Ligue 1, meanwhile, is far behind.
The French first division is only 22nd with an average of “only” 98.6 kilometers per formation per meeting.
Several factors can explain the disparities between the competitions: among others, the differences in the principles of the game, in the individual technical quality, in the aggressiveness or in the severity of the refereeing.
La Liga more physically intense than the Premier League?
Another statistic deserves to be highlighted.
The CIES Football Observatory also analyzed the “
average distance covered in high intensity (> 19.8 km / h) per outfield and per match
”.
And again, the results are a bit astonishing.
While the Premier League, known for being the most spectacular domestic competition in the world, is third in this ranking with 790.1 meters covered per outfield player per game in high intensity, it remains quite far from La Liga, which is still in head with no less than 803.9 meters made.
Strangely, the Bundesliga (16th; 731.7m) is below the average which stands at 734 meters.
Ligue 1 is 24th with 699.3 meters.
A correlation between sprints and victories?
The research group also studied the distance covered by sprinting and found an interesting correlation without being able to establish a clear causal link: “
In terms of results at the level of matches, the players of the victorious teams cover more distance. sprinting (> 25.2 km / h) than their opponents.
However, this primarily reflects the greater propensity of the teams which gain the advantage of acting on the counter-attack, and not a significant difference between players in the competitions analyzed in terms of running capacities
, ”specifies the CIES.