In his latest guest article. Tom Irving, certified scout and analyst, looks at how Heart of Midlothian players compare within the Scottish Premiership using a ranking system he has developed.

Data is valuable. But, as is often the case in life, context means everything.

When it comes to recruitment and performance analysis, data analysts need to have a way to put their findings into context for the management team. It’s pointless saying a central defender wins 70 per cent of their headers unless you know how that compares to other players in that league. And if the player in question is plying their trade in another league, how does that information transfer to your league? Does the foreign league favour big, physical forwards, which results in a lower win percentage for defensive headers? Until you can answer questions like this, the raw data isn’t much use.

One of the most popular ways to quantify and present this data is to work out what percentile a player is for each metric, and then put these findings into an easy-to-view graph, like below.

Craig Halkett's 2021/22 season expressed as a radar chart, highlighting how big a loss he has been for Hearts.

Frankie Kent's 2022/23 season in comparison with both Scottish Premiership and English League One central defenders. You can see his defensive stats don’t quite match up to what we see in a maroon shirt, highlighting a difference in league or team style of play.

When looking at how a player performs as a whole, some analysts will create ranking systems. These systems can list, in order, the players who are performing the best depending on metrics important to their respective positions. I’ve created a ranking system for central defenders, central midfielders, wide players and forwards, and I’m going to share my findings with you, giving some context to how some of Hearts players are doing this season in comparison with their opposite numbers in the Scottish Premiership.

READ MORE: Transfer review: How have new Hearts recruits settled into life at Tynecastle?

How the ranking system works

Using data from Wyscout, I’ve selected all the metrics I feel are relevant for each position. As you can imagine, the central defenders are judged heavily on their defensive and possession-based metrics, forwards and wide players by their ability to create and score goals, and central midfielders on a wider variety of metrics.

Next, I weighted a number of the scores based on their importance to the position. Weighting is when you apply a multiplier to a specific score or metric to make it more accurately represented in the context. For example, goal scoring is highly important to a forward so it will be weighted highly, giving goal scoring a higher importance towards a forward's overall score. While goal scoring for a central midfielder is welcome, it’s not as important as it is for a forward, and will be weighted slightly less in their ranking system.

Players involved in these systems have all played over 700 minutes for their clubs this season, giving a good sample size with quality data.

READ MORE: Hearts under Steven Naismith analysed in eight graphs - pressing, passing, shooting

The results

Forwards

It’s no surprise that our highest-rated forward is the one and only Lawrence Shankland, sitting in fourth place out of all 21 forwards in the league. The highest-rated forward sits on 16.7 points and lowest on 8.6, with Shankland on a respectable 15.8.

Shankland ranks highly for metrics like xG, goals, shots, touches in the box, progressive passes, and passes to the penalty area. Having zero assists this season, if you discount the own goal against Kilmarnock, has left him struggling on this front, and his shots on target and successful dribbles may not have been as high as expected but may point to him having to to take on too much of the attacking burden.

READ MORE: How a few steps infield could result in a giant leap forward for Barrie McKay

Central midfielders

Hearts are represented by four players in this category: Cammy Devlin, Alex Lowry, Calem Nieuwenhof, and Beni Baningime. Lowry and Devlin both rate highly, with the Scotland Under-21 internationalist placed ninth (26.7 points) out of 38 players, and the Australian in 11th (25 points).

With the points ranging from 34.1 to 11.1, both players have performed well in the rankings. Both players rank highly in progressive passes, passes to the final third, dribbles and duels per 90. Devlin ranks much higher on successful duels, aerial duels per 90 and their success rate, interceptions, and passing accuracy. Lowry, meanwhile, ranks higher on xG, shots per 90, assists, xA and touches in the box.

Two completely different midfielders - both of whom are able to impress in their own ways.

READ MORE: 4 reasons for Hearts' huge defensive improvement - style, set pieces, Kent, back 3

Central defenders

Hearts are represented by two players in this field: Kye Rowles, and Frankie Kent. With the scores ranging from 26.9 to 11.5, Hearts have one player in fifth place on 24.2 points, and the other in ninth place on 21.8. Both are in great positions considering the field is made up of 36 players.

What may be surprising to some is that Rowles is the higher rated of the two. The Australia international performs much better on successful defensive actions, shots blocked, interceptions, successful dribbles, and the majority of passing metrics. It’s not surprising, though, that Kent performs much better on numbers of duels and aerial duels won, while also conceding fewer fouls.

Rowles sometimes gets a hard time due to him not being as big and physical as some fans think he needs to be to play in Scotland, but he shows that he excels at other aspects of the game.

READ MORE: How Hearts can get the most out of Beni Baningime, Cammy Devlin and Alex Lowry

Wide players

Due to the formation Hearts play, and a filter used to only count each player in their most played position, Hearts only have one player represented in this category: Alex Cochrane. With the Englishman most often played in a wing-back position, he’s classed in the same category as wide midfielders instead of alongside full-backs, as are all other-wing backs in the league.

Cochrane occupies seventh place out of 24 wide players. The 23-year-old’s passing is one of his strong points, ranking highly with progressive passes, passes to the penalty area, passes to the final third, and crosses per 90. He may not lead the way with many metrics, but he also doesn’t rank very low on many metrics.

Being consistent across the board has helped Cochrane stay high up the overall rankings. With the scores running from 22.3 down to 9.4 points, Cochrane’s 17 is pretty good.