The Senegalese defender’s transfer from Napoli to the west London club has been officially announced. The transfer fee is estimated to be approximately £31 million.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!The addition of Koulibaly could help Chelsea’s supporters forget about Antonio Rudiger’s departure heading into the 2022–23 season.
The charming German had a fantastic season in 2021–2022 at Stamford Bridge, but this summer he chose to join Real Madrid on a free transfer.
However, Koulibaly has arguably improved Chelsea’s center-back unit, and we have the statistics to back it up.
We compared the total league data from the previous season for Koulibaly, Rudiger, Virgil van Dijk, and Ruben Dias using Squawka’s Matrix Comparison tool.
The 18 stats used to judge the quartet of world-class defenders are as follows:
- Games played
- Touches
- Ball recoveries
- Passes completed
- Pass accuracy %
- Long pass accuracy %
- Tackles made
- Take-ons completed
- Take-on success %
- Aerial duels won
- Aerial duel success %
- Ground duels won
- Ground duel success %
- Clearances
- Interceptions
- Blocks
- Clean sheets
- Goals conceded
Remember, all the stats on show are per 90 minutes, to make the whole comparison process a lot fairer.
Here’s the final results…
Van Dijk: 4.5
Dias: 4.5
Rudiger: 1
Koulibaly: 8
Winner: Koulibaly
Well played, Kalidou.
The newest addition to Chelsea’s roster easily outperformed the other four defenders in terms of statistics last season, which took us off guard.
However, we must also emphasize that football doesn’t precisely operate that way, thus the foursome cannot be judged only on the basis of the stats above.
Koulibaly is compelled to make more clearances, interceptions, and blocks per 90 minutes since he played for a Napoli club that wasn’t as dominating as Liverpool, Manchester City, or Chelsea.
However, it is quite intriguing because Koulibaly dominates the field in terms of successfully completing takedowns.
In 2022–2023, Chelsea will undoubtedly benefit greatly from the 31-year-ability old’s to bring the ball out from the back and spark assaults by gliding past opponents.
Edouard Mendy, Koulibaly, Thiago Silva, Trevoh Chalobah, Reece James, and Ben Chilwell make up Chelsea’s back-six, and with Raheem Sterling joining the front line, the club is one to keep an eye on in the next campaign.
