First team

BEN YEDDER'S PROMISING NUMBERS MAKE HIM SECOND MOST EFFICIENT GOALSCORER IN THE LEAGUE

03/06/2017

The striker has a better record than Luis Fabiano, Kanouté and Negredo, and is close to that of Bacca and Gameiro in their respective first seasons at the club

Ben Yedder's debut season at Sevilla FC has been a fruitful one. The forward's numbers demonstrate his worth to the team, and he could even have improved on them had he had a more consistent place in the starting line up. The highest number of consecutive league starts he managed was five, a run in which the former Toulouse striker bagged four goals and an assist, including his hat-trick away at Real Sociedad. He also recorded a hat-trick and an assist in the second leg of the cup tie against SD Formentera.

In total, Ben Yedder made 42 appearances in his first season at Sevilla, 26 of which were starts, and he completed 90 minutes just nine times, finishing with figures of 18 goals and six assists. A number of those goals proved crucial, such as his strike at home against Lyon and his brace against Alavés which secured the three points late on. He also scored away in Vitoria, where Sevilla earned a tough point and at home to Celta where he rescued two points after Aspas had equalised.

The forward averages a goal every 126 minutes and is the second most efficient in the league after Morate

The numbers, as well as making him the squad's leading goalscorer in the season just gone, give him an average of a goal every 126 minutes (playing 2,268 minutes in total) at a rate of 4.30 shots per goal. Only Morate, with 15 goals in 26 games, was more efficient in LaLiga.

Ben Yedder's performance has outdone that of the likes of Frederic Kanouté or Luis Fabiano in their first season at the club (05/06). The Malian scored 14 goals and recorded one assist in 55 appearances in all competitions (LaLiga, UEFA Cup and Copa del Rey). The Brazilian forward, for his part, scored got seven goals and one assist in 35 appearences in all competitions.

With fewer appearances, he has recorded better initial numbers than Kanouté and Negredo

He has also beaten the figures of Álvaro Negredo's, who arrived in Nervión four years later than Kanouté and Fabiano (in the 09/10 season. He scored 14 times, gave six assists in 47 matches in all competitions.

He did not manage to beat Bacca and Gameiro, finishing the season three goals away from the 21 scored by both in their debut season at Sevilla FC (both arrived in 13/14). Both the Colombian and the Frenchman bagged over twenty goals, while the former also recorded 12 assists, compared to the latter's four. Bacca, for his part, started 39 games and made 52 appearances overall, while Gameiro put together his figures in 49 appearances and 27 starts.