Let’s Talk about PPDA!
There is a newly emerged talking point that has ”entered” the Indian Football conversational sphere. Surprisingly, it was not directly because of the famous dashboards of John (where it is ever-present) *coughs*. Anyway, it’s here and now is a good time to understand it before it spreads like wildfire.
What is PPDA?
PPDA stands for Passes Per Defensive Action and was created by Colin Trainor in 2014.
PPDA = Number of Passes made by Attacking Team / Number of Defensive Actions
Defensive actions considered:
- Tackles
- Clearances
- Interceptions
- Fouls
NOTE: in both passes and defensive actions, all the attempts are considered irrespective of outcome. This is because we want to measure defensive intensity and not necessarily ball-winning prowess.
Let’s take an example of calculating PPDA for Team A who is attacking left to right. Team B has 100 passes in “calculation area” (see shaded area in pic above) and Team A has 10 defensive actions in the same area. Then the PPDA for Team A is 100/10 = 10
How to Read PPDA?
Let me start by saying that this stat is an indicator of the defensive (specifically pressing) intensity of a team in the build-up phase of the opposition and does not necessarily say whether a team is good or bad defensively. Usually, teams that sit back most of the 90 mins will have a higher PPDA value than those who play high pressing. So, avoid thinking and saying PPDA of x value is “amazing” or “worst” or any similar adjectives.
Having said that, since PPDA is an indicator stat, it does point towards how the teams perform in terms of scoring goals and winning. Consider any league/tournament and you will see that almost every top performing team will have a lower PPDA value. You can simply think of this correlation as the less you allow your opposition to have possession of the ball the more probability you will have to create goal-scoring chances. However, remember there is correlation but not a causation, i.e. having more of the ball can provide a team with opportunities to create goal-scoring chances but that is not automatically a given.
PPDA at the Asian Cup
All graphs and numbers shown henceforth were generated after the Group B final round of matches and before the Group C final round matches
For reference to read Fig 1 below, the average PPDA at the Asian Cup 2023 so far is 11.
You can see that most of the teams having a low PPDA have performed well so far. There was a reason I said “most of the teams”; notably because, if you see Malaysia, they have the same PPDA value as Australia but both teams have diametrically opposite performances in terms of goal-scoring and chance creations. As a matter of fact, Malaysia are bottom of their group with the lowest “xG per match” (0.48) and Australia finished top of their group with the 2nd highest (2.24) “xG per match”. So, Malaysia play with a high defensive (pressing) intensity but it does not necessarily transfer in attacking threat.
PPDA breakdown of India
As you saw in the above graph, India has an overall PPDA of 14.5, which simply indicates to they let the opposition build-up and were not pressing with high intensity. However, if you have seen them play in this tournament, you would have noticed that all 3 of their matches their tactical defensive approaches varied with different opponents.
India’s defensive approach against Australia was, simply put, “park the bus” as is also evident from the graph below
Against, Uzbekistan, both teams had a similar defensive intensity overall and you can see the periods where India upped their pressing and conceded goal #2 and #3. Beware, once again I say, this is a correlation and not necessarily a causation. In general, there may be other factors at play (specifically here the 2nd goal was a defensive error)
In a must-win match, India upped their pressing intensity. They had to have more of the ball to create more of the chances and the resulting numbers are understandable considering that context.
Conclusion
PPDA is a very handy stat to have quick clue about the pressing intensity of a team and is not to be used as a “good/bad” evaluator at face value. It is especially important to connect it to other metrics like ball recovery, final 3rd entries, field tilt, shots, goals and of course wins. Going forward, let’s talk about PPDA the way it was intended. Happy PPDAing🙂
TL;DR — PPDA points towards defensive (pressing) intensity, it is not necessarily good or bad
