Alan Duffy: Regular (Opta) Joes

HEADING into the weekend, Arsenal winger Bukayo Saka is on course to equal Paul Merson’s club record of playing 82 Premier League games in a row for the Gunners.

Merson set his record between February 1995 and February 1997, but the Gunners’ star man Saka now looks set to match him, if he is picked to play of course.

Saka is also top of the charts for current consecutive appearances in the Premier League, with teammate Gabriel, who came on as a sub against Nottingham forest, second in the list.

Saka’s importance to Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta is undoubted and it’s easy to see why, with the England attacker one of only two players to hit double figures for both goals and assists in the top-flight last season.

However, the 21-year-old saw his form arguably drop off in the run-in last season, an inevitability for an ever-present youngster who also managed to squeeze in a World Cup campaign in the autumn.

Saka still has a long way to go to match Frank Lampard’s Herculean run of 164 appearances in a row for a single club (Chelsea between 2001 and 2005), which remains the longest streak by an outfield player, and one only bettered by two goalkeepers (Tim Howard – 210 with Everton and Pepe Reina – 183 with Liverpool).

Second on that list is Lampard’s former Chelsea teammate Wayne Bridge, a well-travelled fullback who himself holds the outright record for an outfield player for consecutive full games in the Premier League, stringing together a mammoth 112 complete games (all for Southampton) between 2000 and 2003 and encompassing two full consecutive seasons (2000-01 and 2001-02. Indeed, Bridge is one of only four non-keepers to play every minute of two Premier League campaigns in a row (also Conor Coady, James Ward-Prowse and Alan Wright).

While Bukayo Saka is still in the springtime of his burgeoning career, another player gracing the top-flight this season is very much at other end of his, albeit still going very strong indeed.

James Milner made his Premier League debut in November 2002 for Leeds United against West Ham, at the tender age of 16 years and 310 days – at the time making him the fourth-youngest player to grace the competition. One month later, Milner did bag a record for himself, becoming the youngest player to score in the Premier League, netting against Sunderland on Boxing Day 2002, at just 16 years and 356 days old.

Fast forward 21 seasons and the seasoned utility man is still at it, starting for Brighton on Matchday One this season in their impressive 4-1 mauling of new-boys Luton. That appearance, in a right-back berth, gave Milner his 22nd consecutive season in Premier League, a joint-high figure along with Manchester United legend Ryan Giggs.

The goalkeepers’ union will be knocking on our door if we don’t give them some sort of shout-out, so here’s a list of the longest consecutive runs of starts in the Premier League, a ranking unsurprisingly dominated by veteran glovesmen.

US ‘keeper Brad Friedel leads the way overall, courtesy of a cougar-hearted run of 310 games starting in 2004 with Blackburn Rovers, continuing via a stint with Aston Villa and finally ending a whopping eight years later with Tottenham. Saka and co. have some way to go to match that.

Despite the innovations, squad rotations, squad depth and myriad coaching styles which have developed since 1992-93, no real pattern has emerged when it comes to the frequency of outfield players playing every minute of a Premier League campaign.

However, last season did see just one player complete the heroic task, via the sturdy frame of Everton defender James Tarkowski. This comes after seven in 2019-20, two in 2020-21, and none in 2021-22 so we may finally be seeing some sort of pattern!

So, what does all this mean? Is there any benefit for teams not rotating players or for indulging in some regular weekly tinkering?

Looking at Premier League title winners, last season saw Pep Guardiola’s all-conquering Manchester City side use the fewest players in the league yet also make the third-most line-up changes.

This seems to follow a general trend (excluding some converse figures in a few seasons) where the team who ultimately lifts the trophy uses a comparatively small pool of players yet rotates those players frequently.

As for Saka and co., Mikel Arteta made just 38 starting XI changes with Arsenal last season, the lowest total in the Premier League, while only the Citizens (24), West Ham and Brentford (25 each) used fewer players.

Therefore, it comes as little surprise that a couple of injuries and season fatigue took its toll on the Gunners in the final run-in, something Arteta and, indeed, every manager in the top-flight, will be acutely aware of this time around.