Seeking a creative midfielder? Here's where to start

Ranking 25 advanced midfielders so far this season

Production out of midfield has been such a hot topic among Arsenal fans this season. Of course, Kai Havertz has a lot to do with it, having been a supposed upgrade in goal-scoring and assists over Granit Xhaka that hasn’t really provided that to date. The tailed-off performance of Martin Ødegaard certainly hasn’t helped, either. But hey: Both played well this weekend, so let’s hope that’s changing.

Now, I don’t know that Arsenal are actually in the market for anyone in this sort of creative/advanced midfield role. But that’s never stopped me from ranking a bunch of guys, now has it? Plus, it’s fun! So buckle up, and let’s take a look.

Here’s the deal:

• This list is created relying fully on statistics from this season. It’s early! Expect this to change quite a bit from now to spring, as per usual.

• Please note this data was pulled prior to this past weekend’s games. It was a holiday weekend, but I did intend to finish it prior to the Brentford game. I couldn’t, and I’m sorry!

• Speaking of it being early, even lots of regular starters simply haven’t played enough minutes to be evaluated here. My normal minimum is 900 minutes, but for this week I took anyone with at least 700 in their league. We are missing some guys, I’m sorry.

• I generally aimed toward pre-prime or early prime, so again you’ll find no 28+ players here.

• Also, these guys are not all necessarily true attacking 8s or 10s. But they’ve provided output this season, along with decent ball progression, ball security, directness and decent box-to-box stuff like tackles, etc.

• I always encourage a healthy dose of the eye test before forming a final opinion on any player, so consume responsibly.

• There is obviously a subjective element to any man-made formulaic ranking. But for the record, these rankings are based on performance across 20 statistics, each with different weight toward the final score.

• All scores are subject to an adjustment according to league strength, so you shouldn’t have to mentally raise or lower rankings to make it more “fair.”

The natural question here is always, “Where do Arsenal’s players rank?” And I don’t blame you. So here’s a quick breakdown.