Underrated Mooy would be a huge loss

As A-League fans against modern football, the finals series and irony pack up their bags for the season, a bit of retrospection illuminates some interesting facts.

All will agree that the Wanderers were nowhere near as efficient and brutally effective this season as last. Defence has been oddly leaky, while offensive phases have been more about allegedly racist insults than scoring goals.

A key discussion has been regarding the optimal midfield combination. Shinji Ono is a certain starter, when fit; but the holding midfield is a bit more controversial. Mateo Poljak has been superb for the last two seasons, but left out of the ACL squad. Meanwhile, La Rocca has been criticised for a lack of mobility which has cost the team on numerous occasions.

One name, however, unusually less popular this season, is Aaron Mooy. The midfielder, last season touted as a potential Socceroo, has taken a role out of the spotlight. So much so that he has reportedly agreed a move away from the Wanderers, to newly named Melbourne City, next season.

Many fans were mildly disappointed by these reports, but really, they should be devastated. The Western Sydney local has been statistically the best midfielder for the Wanderers this season, and one of the best in the league.

Our midfield has been weak, often dominated; look no further than our recent game against Kawasaki. Our passing accuracy of 78% is the lowest in the top six. Aaron Mooy, interestingly, has been a shining light.

The twenty three year old has notched up 1243 passes this season, by far the most of any in our squad and almost twice that of Poljak and La Rocca. Tellingly, the next two highest passers of the ball are defenders in Topor Stanley and D’Apuzzo. He has more touches per game than anyone else in our team. Aaron Mooy keeps our midfield ticking.

But does he hold up defensively? While admittedly not as imposing in this regard as Poljak or La Rocca, his statistics tell an interesting story once more; with eighty two tackles, he again has completed more than anyone else in our team and again has completed almost twice as many as Mateo or Iacopo.

In fact, Mooy has the highest tackles on average per game in the entire league. And incredibly, he has given away less fouls than Brattan, Montgomery, Traore and D’Apuzzo (the other top five tacklers in the league), and even than Poljak or La Rocca (who have completed less tackles in total). His defensive work rate is supremely underrated.

Going forward, then, you say? Mooy’s creativity is undoubtable. His tactical awareness and distribution, when at his best, is up there with any in the competition. Interestingly, he’s also taken more shots than any other Wanderers player this season and the second highest amount of crosses into the box, behind Ono.

Losing Mooy to Melbourne would be a disastrous blow for the Wanderers and a fantastic pick up for Manchester City’s new Australian experiment (their first Australian experiment was Danny Tiatto). The fact that Mooy doesn’t take up a visa spot is another handy bonus. With Shinji Ono leaving as well, Popovic will have a lot of work to do in rebuilding his squad.

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