Ahead of this Saturday night’s Elimination Final, we look at the evolution of Melbourne Victory’s Daniel Arzani through data.
Since the moment Daniel Arzani burst onto the scene in 2018, it was clear he possessed a skillset that was rare in Australian football.
A winger blessed with unerring confidence to take on defenders and drive forward, he was fast-tracked into the Socceroos and became the youngest player to represent Australia at a FIFA Men’s World Cup, leading to a move to Premier League giants Manchester City.
A lot has changed in the seven years since.
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After ill-fated loan moves to Celtic, Utrecht, AGF and Lommel, Arzani became the poster boy for unfulfilled potential, returning to the A-Leagues in the hope of reversing his career trajectory and becoming the player he always threatened to be.
No longer a budding talent at 26 years of age, stints at Macarthur Bulls and now Melbourne Victory have seen the talented winger earn a return to the national team fold.
However, his recent selection for March’s crucial FIFA World Cup qualifiers was met with confusion among the football public; why had Tony Popovic picked a player who at that point had only one goal and two assists to his name in the Isuzu UTE A-League this season?
The answer lies within his data.
Put simply, Arzani is now a player whose impact cannot purely be measured in goals and assists. In the years since his rapid emergence, the 26-year-old has enjoyed a coming of age – partly under Popovic at Victory – becoming a far more complete footballer.
Traits Insights, an analytics platform used increasingly by some of Europe’s top clubs, provides a new digestible way to interpret the numbers, weighting metrics that matter in specific positions to deliver a rating comprising four key facets of football – scoring, creating, passing and defending.
Overall, Arzani ranks fifth overall in the Isuzu UTE A-League this season among players to feature in 10 or more matches in a single position, and is the top rated Australian Attacking Midfielder.
His 3.18 rating across scoring, creating, passing and defending – each comprising dozens of data points reduced down to an easy to understand number – is bettered only by Ben Garuccio, Joe Lolley, Jed Drew and assist leader Marin Jakolis.
Statistically, the Victory winger is enjoying the best season of his career to date, having reworked his game on the back of criticism around his attitude and defensive workrate.
Explained: How the Traits Insights rating system works
Traits puts players’ data into context by benchmarking them against other players in their position and competition.Traits’ unique approach to talent evaluation uses a layered framework of statistics which consolidates raw data into each individual metric, which then feeds into a series of ratings – see image below for a detailed breakdown.
A player’s data is benchmarked relative to the competition average and variance of performances in their position.
Ratings at all levels (Overall, and for specific traits and metrics) are set to the same 0-5 scale.; ratings above 3 are considered good, 2.5 is the competition average and anything below 2 is considered somewhat poor.
Each positional model is weighted in accordance with a player’s role within the team. Traits default positional profiles into a robust 433 formation, however clubs can adjust and align the platform with what they value most in each position.
“Going as a young player from Melbourne City where I was doing really well and they were a little bit more relaxed about me doing defensive work because I was so good for the team going forward,” Arzani explained to Optus Sport in 2024.
“But you’re not really offered those luxuries when you’re going to teams in Europe.”
Looking historically at Arzani’s defensive data, a pattern emerges. His final season in Europe, spent in Belgium with SK Lommel, marks a turning point – and his return to Australia has seen an increase in defensive output with every passing campaign.
In 2024-25, he ranks third among Isuzu UTE A-League attacking midfielders for off-ball defensive work; this is effectively proof that Arzani has turned one of his biggest weaknesses into a strength. He is no longer a liability without the ball, but an asset – something Popovic stressed was imperative during his time at Victory.
As may be expected, Arzani’s scoring metrics are relatively poor, ranking 27th in the competition. He is not a goal scorer – last season’s return of four goals is his career best – but what he lacks in front of goal, he makes up for elsewhere in the final third.
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Statistically, the 9-time Socceroo is the top passer in the Isuzu UTE A-League. His 3.53 rating pips the likes of Aleksandr Susnjar (3.49), Douglas Costa (3.43), Jake Brimmer (3.41), Leo Sena (3.41) and Jay O’Shea (3.38), thanks largely to his efficient passing into the final third and level of involvement in Victory attacks.
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Arzani has also developed into an elite creator and dribbler. Among attacking midfielders, only Brisbane Roar’s Jacob Brazete trumps him when it comes to threat running with the ball; only Douglas Costa is ahead for combination play.
“I think I’m a much more complete player than I was back then,” Arzani said.
“I was just a young boy breaking onto the scene. I feel like now I have many more aspects to my game, I feel like I contribute a lot more to the team defensively, I feel like I have a better end product.”
When you compare Arzani’s numbers to his competitors for a Socceroos berth, his recent selection becomes not only uncontroversial but logical.
He has become a different profile of wide player, bringing something different to the rising crop of stars who have emerged via the A-Leagues in the past few seasons.
The likes of Nishan Velupillay, Adrian Segecic, Nicolas Milanovic and Nestory Irankunda are streets ahead when it comes to goal scoring, but Arzani’s ability as a creator, technician and off-ball defender means he brings variety to a Socceroos squad, allowing Popovic to equip himself for different scenarios.
In early 2025, the national team coach blasted his former Victory pupil, demanding: “He needs to raise his level. We need goals, we need assists. Doing one good dribble, one good trick or setting up one goal should not be enough to play for the Socceroos. There needs to be more.”
Clearly, there is now more to Arzani’s game.
Traits Insights also allows users to compare data to identify similar players across world football, helping coaches, sporting directors and executives better understand the profile of player they are looking at.
Looking at Europe’s top five leagues over the past five seasons specifically, Arzani’s closest matches in technical profile are Hakim Ziyech at Chelsea in 2021-22, Matias Soule at Roma in the current campaign, and Michael Olise at Crystal Palace in 2021-22. Each are standouts in their craft amongst Europe’s elite, and credited for being key cogs in their teams.
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Arzani may no longer be the purely attack-focused excitement machine he was as a teenager, but he is now a more rounded footballer with a lot more to offer than is credited within goals and assists – and the future remains bright.
