World Cup Goalkeepers Basic Stat breakdown.
One of the not-so-great byproducts of the World Cup is that many people feel the need to create spreadsheets containing some of the most obscure statistics, the vast majority of which fall somewhere between “Do we really need this” and “I might be able to use this one on Trivia Night”. I wish I could say that I was immune to this phenomenon, but when the Guardian published a datasheet with all the WC players’ vital stats on it, I just had to tinker with it. You can find the original Guardian data file here
Using the Guardian’s data as a start I filtered out the goalkeepers and added the height and weight information for each player, for no other reason that to come up with the following goalkeeper statistics (I used kilograms and centimeters because that it what most of the civilized world uses. If you insist on converting to US lbs. and feet just remember, 1 kg is 2.2222 lb and 30 centimeter is about a foot):
The Average World Cup GK at a glance
Avg Age: 28.45 (Range 20–43 / Median: 28)
Avg Height (in cm.) 187.7 (Range 178-199 / Median 188)
Avg Weight (in kg.) 81.85 (Range 68-95 / Median 82)
Avg Caps 23.96 (Range 0 – 153 / Median 9)
Total International Goals scored by WC Keepers 0
Top Leagues Represented:
England 10
France 8
Germany 7
Spain 5
Italy 4
Belgium 4
Russia 4
Most Caps:
Iker CASILLAS Spain 153
Gianluigi BUFFON Italy 139
Noel VALLADARES Honduras 120
Stipe PLETIKOSA Croatia 110
Tim HOWARD USA 100
Fewest Caps:
Luis LOPEZ Honduras 0
Oliver ZELENIKA Croatia 0
Mattia PERIN Italy 0
David DE GEA Spain 0
Roman BUERKI Switzerland 0
Camilo VARGAS Colombia 0
LEE Bumyoung South Korea 0
Sammy BOSSUT Belgium 0
Jasmin FEJZIC Bosnia & Herzegovina 0
Rodrigo MUNOZ Uruguay 0
Oldest Goalkeepers:
Faryd MONDRAGON Colombia 43
Noel VALLADARES Honduras 37
Gianluigi BUFFON Italy 36
Nick Rimando USA 35
Tim Howard USA 35
Youngest Goalkeepers:
Stefanos KAPINO Greece 20
Luis LOPEZ Honduras 20
Oliver ZELENIKA Croatia 21
Mattia PERIN Italy 21
Sayouba MANDE Ivory Coast 21
Heaviest (in kg):
Jasmin FEJZIC Bosnia & Herzegovina 95
Brad GUZAN USA 95
LEE Bumyoung South Korea 94
Faryd MONDRAGON Colombia 94
Pepe REINA Spain 92
Manuel NEUER Germany 92
Lightest (in kg):
Cedric SI MOHAMMED Algeria 68
Boubacar BARRY Ivory Coast 69
Igor AKINFEEV Russia 71
Patrick PEMBERTON Costa Rica 72
Maty RYAN Australia 73
Hugo LLORIS France 73
Tallest (in cm.):
LEE Bumyoung South Korea 199
Thibaut COURTOIS Belgium 198
Jasmin FEJZIC Bosnia & Herzegovina 197
Stefanos KAPINO Greece 197
Joe HART England 196
Asmir BEGOVIC Bosnia & Herzegovina 196
Alexander DOMINGUEZ Ecuador 196
Shortest (in cm.):
Nick RIMANDO USA 178
Noel VALLADARES Honduras 179
Patrick PEMBERTON Costa Rica 179
Fraser FORSTER England 180
Donis ESCOBER Honduras 180
Fatawu DAUDA Ghana 180
Like the above wasn’t enough superfluous information, I decided to break the categories down by country. Of course, this doesn’t mean much since with only three goalkeepers, a single outlier, like Casillas, will skew the average significantly. (and every average will end in either .00, .33 or .67) but there are some interesting surprises in the numbers, for instance, the low amount of average caps of the Netherlands goalkeepers (8.67), which have an average age of 27.0 and include Premier League starters Vorm and Krul. (I think we can blame van der Sar’s and Stekelenburg’s longevity for that). We also might have to start asking ourselves what it is that the Bosnians put in their cevapcici because they “grow ’em big” over there.
Statistics by Country:
Most Average Caps:
Spain 61.67
Italy 49.00
Honduras 46.67
Nigeria 45.00
USA 46.33
Fewest Average Caps:
Cameroon 4.00
Australia 5.67
Iran 6.33
Greece 7.33
Netherlands 8.67
Oldest Average Age:
USA 33.0
Brazil 32.0
Columbia 31.0
Mexico 30.7
Uruguay 30.3
Youngest Average Age:
Greece 25.0
Belgium 25.33
Cameroon 25.67
South Korea 25.67
Switzerland 26.00
Tallest Average Height (in cm)
Bosnia & Herzegovina 194.33
Belgium 192.67
Croatia 192.00
South Korea 192.00
Argentina 191.67
Shortest Average Height (in cm)
Honduras 180.33
Costa Rica 182.00
Chile 184.00
Mexico 185.00
Cameroon 185.33
France 185.33
Ghana 185.33
Japan 185.33
Portugal 185.33
Highest Average Weight (in kg.)
USA 88.67
Bosnia & Herzegovina 88.00
Germany 86.67
South Korea 86.67
Argentina 86.00
Lowest Average Weight (in kg.)
Costa Rica 75.67
Ghana 76.00
Algeria 76.67
Honduras 76.67
Russia 78.67
You can download the full spreadsheet I made here: World Cup 2014 GK data
Let the games begin!
Johan