Sunderland stats: Cutting through the frustration to examine Jack Clarke's productivity

Jack Clarke is the most frustrating player in the Sunderland squad - but he's also seriously productive.

Author:
Michael Graham
Updated:
Feb 17, 2023 7:33 AM EST
Original:
Feb 16, 2023

Jack Clarke. Sometimes he thrills, often he frustrates. In an ocean of consistent Sunderland performers, Clarke has established himself as a bit of a maverick.

The reality is that, if we didn’t all know how good he was, he wouldn’t frustrate at all. No one ever got frustrated by a player you knew was never capable of producing.

That has certainly been the view of manager Tony Mowbray, who acknowledged it after Clarke's brace against QPR this week.

"Listen, he can be very frustrating sometimes, Jack Clarke," Mowbray said. "But I suppose most wingers can."

The important thing with Clarke, of course, is that he does produce. In fact he is one of the most productive players in the Sunderland squad this season. It just doesn’t feel like it sometimes because of the frustration.

And frustration isn't really a criticism either. Frustration is borne of an acknowledgement of talent and ability, which Clarke has in abundance. If you don't rate him, you couldn't possibly be frustrated by him.

But just how productive is Jack Clarke? Let’s put it under the microscope a little.


		Rank in Sunderland squad
Goals	8	2nd
Assists	7	1st
Goal contributions	15	1st
Chances created	43	2nd
Chances created per 90	1.6	3rd
Dribble success	50.5%	2nd
Successful dribbles per 90	1.8	2nd

Jack Clarke goals

Clarke has scored eight goals for Sunderland this season in all competitions, which is a tally that can only be beaten by Ross Stewart.

In fairness, Ellis Simms (7) would probably be ahead of Clarke too had he not been recalled from loan early.

Amad Diallo (7) has more league goals for Sunderland this season than Clarke, too.

Stewart, of course, will not play again this season, so there is a very good chance that Clarke will finish the season as the clubs top scorer. It’s looking like a direct race between him and Amad for that.

Clarke is currently three goals behind Stewart (11), with Amad needing four to go level with the Scotsman.

Jack Clarke assists

While Clarke is chasing down Stewart on the goals front, he is top of the assists table for Sunderland.

He has created seven goals for the Black Cats this season, with six of them coming in the Championship.

Four players - Alex Pritchard, Patrick Roberts and Dan Neil - have four assists to their name. Perhaps surprisingly, Amad only has three so far, which is the same as Stewart.

Jack Clarke goal contributions

Those two stats combined mean that no player has been involved in more Sunderland goals this season than Clarke.

He has 15 goal contributions to his name so far (eight goals and seven assists), which puts him ahead of Ross Stewart with 14.

Sunderland have scored 51 goals so far this season (46 in the Championship and five in the FA Cup), which really highlights how productive Clarke has been.

He has been directly involved in around 30% of all Sunderland’s goals, so despite him often frustrating he still deserves an awful lot of recognition.

Jack Clarke creativity

Only Alex Pritchard has created more chances for Sunderland in the Championship than Jack Clarke this season.

Pritchard is bar far the most creative of the Black Cats attacking players. He has made 50 scoring opportunities for teammates so far this season. It should be noted, however, that Pritchard took nearly all the set pieces in the first half of the season, so that skewers the results slightly.

Clarke is second on the list with him creating 43 chances in the Championship so far, which is nine more than the next player on the list, Patrick Roberts (34).

Surprisingly, Amad Diallo is a long way back with just 16.

Chances per 90

Alex Pritchard and Patrick Roberts look on for Sunderland

One large caveat to all of these stats is that no outfield player has played more minutes for Sunderland than Jack Clarke.

That is to his credit as he is clearly very robust and exceptionally fit, but it does affect the stats. He has played more than 900 more minutes than Patrick Roberts, for example.

Therefore the raw data on how many chances he has created is a little loaded in his favour as he has had more time on the pitch.

The chances created per 90 metric sheds further light on it, then, but it still reflects well on Clarke.

He is still third on the list with 1.6 chances created per 90. He can’t compete here with Pritchard (2.6) and Roberts (2.0), though

Dribble success

One of the most frustrating things about Clarke is how often he is easily disposed when dribbling. Much of that is down to a bad touch or a bad decision.

However, he is still one of the most successful dribblers in the Sunderland squad. He has a dribble success rate of 50.5% and completes 1.8 successful dribbles per 90.

Both of those put him in second place for Sunderland this season.

Roberts is way ahead in the per 90 metric, with him producing 3.3 successful dribbles every full game he plays. His success rate (48.7%) is lower than Clarke’s though.

The only player in the Sunderland squad who has a better dribble success rate than Clarke is Elliot Embleton. That is mainly because Embleton is very good at releasing the ball at the right time, while it’s a weakness of Clarke’s.