As explained in this article, the Performance metrics in the SciSports Platform assess the impact of each player's actions on the course of a match.

The defensive variant of Performance considers the actions that mostly contribute to preventing goals. We measure a player’s Performance on a range of four distinct action types. This includes Defensive positioning, Open-play Disruption, Set-pieces Disruption, Transition Forcing, Counter Control & Fouls. The overall chart shows the total contribution on all four action groups. All the defensive performances are compared to players in the same position and league, normalised to a per 90 minutes basis.

Below, a player's defensive metrics are shown compared to other players on the same position in the selected season. By navigating through each action group, users will then see a breakdown of how the player ranks in specific action types.

As you will see below, we have included some video examples of specific action types.

Defensive Positioning

Preventing the opponent from being dangerous without touching the ball. These are the attempts of players of the defending team to decrease the opponent’s scoring chances by positioning well, as Virgil Van Dijk shows in the video below.

For more information on how Defensive Positioning is calculated, please see this article. You can find the definitions of all Defensive Events in this article.