The Castrol EDGE Rankings are the world's first rankings system based on the actual performance of every football player across Europe's top five leagues. They objectively analyse player performance, tracking every move on the field and assessing whether it has a positive or negative impact on a team's ability to score or concede a goal.
The Castrol Index scores are only revealed by Castrol Football during international tournaments, while the Rankings are updated on a monthly basis based on domestic club football only (English Premier League, Spanish La Liga, Italian Serie A, German Bundesliga, French Ligue 1 and UEFA Champions League.)
Castrol Performance Analysts use more than 50,000 scores from domestic and European matches to generate a team strength rating for each club in Europe. The weightings reflect the average team strength in that tournament.
Current tournament standings in order of weighting strength are as follows:
At the end of the football season, the weightings are adjusted accordingly to reflect the strength of each domestic league.
Castrol's team of Performance Analysts use data provided by OPTA, Europe's leading provider of sports performance data, to create the Castrol EDGE Rankings.
All players are ranked irrespective of how many minutes they have played.
There is no minimum number of minutes a player has to play, however a player's points total is divided by the total number of minutes played in the last 12 months. Those who have played less than 2,000 minutes will still have their points total divided by 2,000*, therefore penalising players who are either injured, not selected or suspended for a considerable period of time.
*2,000 minutes is the average number of minutes played by a player who has played in at least 50% of his team's league matches. This equates to 65% of a Bundesliga season and 58% of a season in the other four leagues - excluding Champions League matches.
If a player moves to another club in one of the five leagues measured, his performances for both clubs will contribute to his Castrol Ranking, with the appropriate weightings applied.
If a player joins a team from outside one of the five leagues, his performances only count from the moment he plays for his new club.
If a player leaves a team from one of the five leagues then he will no longer be included in the Castrol EDGE Rankings.
No, the Castrol EDGE Rankings are calculated on a per 90 minute score, measuring the quality of each player performance rather than the number of games played.
No, all goals scored are of equal value.
99% of the Top 10 nominees from both the Ballon D’Or & FIFA World Player of the Year awards from 2004-2008 were playing in one of the five leagues Castrol is analysing. Additionally 81% of players who featured in the 2006 FIFA World Cup™ Quarter Finals and 91% of the 'Team of the Tournament' also played in these five leagues. Castrol may expand the Castrol EDGE Rankings to analyse more domestic leagues across the world in future, but this is dependent on getting access to consistent and 100% accurate data.
UEFA Champions League matches are the highest ranked games in the Castrol EDGE Rankings. A good UEFA Champions League performance is ranked higher than a good league performance. However there are fewer UEFA Champions League games, so to feature near the top of the Castrol EDGE Rankings a player must have good league and good UEFA Champions League performances.
Yes it is possible, if a player has consistently high performances in their domestic league.
A defender could top the Castrol EDGE Rankings. The Castrol EDGE Rankings are calculated so that in each match the Castrol Index score awarded does not depend on the player’s position.
The purpose of the Castrol EDGE Rankings is to determine who the best performing player is over the previous 12 months, not the best performing player of that given month. Therefore no award will be given.
At the end of the European domestic season Castrol will announce the final rankings standing, noting the best performing player.
