Since the moment Skipp broke a bone in his foot in May, Norwich have been in need of a defensive midfielder. The summer transfer window saw the arrival of Billy Gilmour and Pierre Lees-Melou to strengthen the midfield, but neither felt like the combative ball winner that Norwich needed. Then Mathias Normann came and saved the day. But…
(cue record scratch)
What if I was to tell you that Mathias Normann also isn’t a ball winning midfielder?
Okay, that is probably an oversimplification but Normann isn’t an out-and-out midfield destroyer, or a player who stays deep sweeping up any danger that arrives in front of the defence. In fact, it is quite hard to exactly place what type of player Mathias Normann is at all.
He has one of the highest numbers for percentage adjusted interceptions for defensive midfielders, but he also takes a large number of shots. He says he is a player that likes to dictate, but only completes 75% of his passes. He’s under 6ft tall, but wins 60% of his headers (putting him in the top 10% for defensive midfielders). Most people didn’t know who he was before he signed, but he has 1 million followers on Instagram. A man of contrasts, and that isn’t just his hair.
New Skipp?
The spectre of Skipp has loomed over Norwich’s summer; replacing the young midfielder was a priority as soon as the Norwich’s promotion was confirmed. It seemed clear fairly on that Tottenham would want to include him in their own team so a return loan was unlikely. Billy Gilmour arrived at Norwich early in the window, and while he was instantly compared to Skipp, he was never meant to be his replacement.
A look at each player’s radar shows that Normann has a significant amount of differences to Skipp. It is worth noting that the purely defensive role Skipp performed for Norwich in the Championship was never likely to score him many points statistically. With Norwich dominating the ball there were fewer opportunities for Skipp to show his ability. Much of the good work carried out by Skipp was closing off passing lanes for opponents or filling space vacated by others when attacking.
Passing range
What the radars do show clearly, is the significant difference in Normann’s passing compared to Skipp’s. While they are both playing similar amount of passes per game, Skipp was much more accurate in getting his passes to their intended recipient. This isn’t to say Normann is a bad passer, but it is a byproduct of his trait of playing longer, riskier passes. Normann played 10.7 long passes per 90 over the last year, this is more long passes than any midfielder from the ‘Big 5’ European Leagues, unfortunately his accuracy with his long passes is only 43%, putting him in the lowest 4% of midfielders.
In fact, Normann is in the top 10 percentile for the volume of forward passes, long passes, passes into the final third and passes into the penalty area. He is conversely in the bottom 5 percentile for all those pass types. A picture emerges of a high risk passer, who gives away possession regularly, a player that is different to pretty much every other midfielder Norwich have played under Daniel Farke, who has always stressed the importance of maintaining possession and controlling the game. Normann’s short pass game is also far from accurate, with 14% of short or medium passes losing possession. Overall for all pass types Normann has a pass accuracy of 75% — this places him in the bottom percentile when compared to other midfielders. However, Normann’s passing game is high risk/high reward and he creates a large amount of shooting opportunities for his teammates.
Normann’s passing does seem partly system based, when playing for Norway compared to Rostov he reduced the number of long passes made (although the accuracy remained about the same) and his game became slightly more reserved. You’d imagine under Farke he would look to harness Normann’s passing range, but also expect him to improve on his overall accuracy in order to minimise turnovers. Norwich have shown more willing to use longer passes already this season, especially switches from one side of the pitch to the other, or looking to play into space behind defences for Rashica or Tzolis (in the League Cup) to run onto.
Defensive work
As well as high volumes of passing, Normann gets involved in a good amount of defensive actions. These are primarily interceptions and blocking shots over attempting tackles, but when he does go in for one he very good at winning the ball, he is ranked as a 99 out of 100 in defensive duels by SmarterScout.
With just over 12 recoveries per 90 in the League, Normann ranked among the highest in Russia, and performed especially well in counterpressing recoveries with 8 per 90. As shown in his recoveries map, Normann operated across the pitch in his defensive work, but most of his recoveries came down the ‘half-spaces’ either side of the centre circle, with more on the left hand side as that was where he was deployed more often.
When compared to Skipp at Norwich in the Championship (below), it is possible to see he did most of his defensive work in Norwich’s half and in more central areas compared to Normann. Roughly one third of all Skipp’s recoveries were in the defensive third of the pitch, for Normann this is one quarter.
This shows that Normann isn’t a defensive midfielder in the mould of Oliver Skipp, he isn’t going to sit deep while others attack waiting to break up play and recycle the possession to Norwich’s more creative players. Normann is a more proactive midfielder, he’ll go looking to win tackles and interceptions high up the pitch, and then try more adventurous passes once he has won the ball. This adventurous spirit is also reflected in the large amount of shots he will take, at just over 2 per 90 (more than Josh Sargent averaged in his three seasons at Bremen). Although around a third of these shots came from free kicks, where he failed to score from 9 attempts in the last year. He is also unafraid to shoot from range in open play with the vast majority of shots coming from range and with a low chance of scoring.
What he brings
Overall, it is fair to say that Normann could be the most ‘Hollywood’ player to be at Norwich for a while. He will often look for the spectacular, whether that is a pass, shot or Instagram post and when it comes off it is incredible, but there are large number of times it does not come off.
But as Normann is also a player of contrasts, aside from his love of the spectacular, is a player who can do the dirty work. He is excellent in defensive duels, he makes a huge number of interceptions and ball recoveries and wins headers that he would not be expected to win. If Farke can channel Normann’s want for the sensational and keep his graft then Norwich may have brought in a potential game changer.
However, this is not a player that will sit deep, hold his position and snuff out danger before it happens — he wants to be involved and force the issue. Whether he has the skills to continue doing this after he found he was a step above most other players in Russia is a big question mark, there are not many success stories of players stepping out of that league and making an impact in the ‘Big 5’.
If he is a suitable player to take Gilmour’s role at the base of midfield is also up for debate, he doesn’t immediately come across an anchoring player so won’t herald a massive change in the midfield balance. What seems likely is he will move into one of the roles PLM and McLean have been filling, but maybe with a more defensive outlook, equally he could take the central role, but would need to be supported by another midfielder covers behind when Normann pushes forward.
Normann is a fascinating player, this piece could have quite easily been twice the length to cover all his skills, flaws and quirks. For example, not covered is the fact he is a very good dribbler who can glide past challenges, but sometimes does this in his own box. There is work for Farke to do with Normann, but the raw materials are certainly there.
