Football has become a game in which every possible advantage is exploited. In every aspect. Elite-level aspiring teams are beggining the understand that they need to capitalize on the so-called minimal gains. Set pieces are a clear example of minimal gains on a micro level, with designated coaches already part of the technical staff at most clubs in the top leagues. This is something teams like Brentford or Arsenal have long used to take an extra step forward.
At the macro level, the advantages are not so minimal, but establishing an extensive talent scouting network across South America is a very interesting option both economically and performance-wise as Brighton have shown. The connection between FC Nordsjaelland and the Right To Dream academy in Ghana is another example of a European club exploiting untapped ground. The Danish team signs off-the-radar talent, develops it, extracts competitive advantages, and ultimately economic benefits, allowing the club to keep growing.
Today, we focus on this second option. Specifically Japan, a country with a rich football culture that clubs have yet to fully explore, although there are signs of growth. England is one of the countries investing most heavily in Japanese players. In the 22/23 season, there was only one Japanese player in the Championship; this season, there are 11 across 8 of the 24 teams. Three factors combine: post-Brexit rules have facilitated their arrival, there are examples of clubs succeeding with Japanese players in key roles, and being an emerging market, prices are relatively low.
You’ve always had one-off players but a few years ago when Ange Postecoglou arrived at Celtic and signed a few Japanese players, Celtic were winning. There are stereotypes with every market and the question with Japanese players is whether they are physically strong enough to play in British football. Then you see them playing with Celtic and winning titles and that’s a proof point.
Why have Japanese players become so attractive to Championship clubs? — Nancy Froston, The Athletic
In this context, we have selected a profile that marries well with the prototypical Japanese player: technical, dynamic and energetic. A profile who has come back into fashion: the Flying Full-Back, a player who constantly arrives in deep, wide areas and finds teammates inside the box to create danger. We will look for this profile in the J.League.
To identify this profile, we have created an index using the most relevant metrics for the Flying Full-Back role. Not all categories carry the same weight in our evaluation. Instead of distributing the weights evenly at 25% per category, we allocate them according to their importance for the role.
Physical (40%) and Penetration & Production (30%) reward players who can repeatedly perform high-intensity actions to provide offensive support and those capable of delivering the ball into the box, crossing effectively, and creating danger. Arrival is weighted at 20% because we prioritize a full-back who reaches and receives in advanced areas, rather than one who simply makes passes into those zones. Finally, Progression accounts for 10% of the total score, as advancing the ball forward is a valuable additional attribute for this profile.
The next step in our Flying Full-Back Index process is to filter and select the players we want to include in our scoring system. For this, we choose only full-backs—regardless of the side they play on—who have logged at least 1,000 minutes in the current J.League season.
Once the players are selected and the weights assigned, these are the 15 players who scored highest in our Flying Full-Back Index.
Among the 15 full-backs with the highest scores in our Flying Full-Back Index, 7 are under-26. Standouts include Kento Hashimoto, Henry Mochizuki, and Kimito Nono. We will revisit those three profiles later.
Using Driblab data, we can create a scoring system or index tailored to each team’s needs, for every position and specific role. A bold club could invest in one of the full-backs highlighted in this Flying Full-Back Index and extract significant value from players who, for now, are not expensive.
This scatter plot completes the profile of our Flying Full-Back. This prototype requires high dynamism and endurance to repeatedly perform high-intensity actions, but also quality to deliver the ball into the box, whether through passing or carrying it forward. By crossing the first attribute (percentage of total distance covered in high-intensity actions, those over 19.8 km/h) with the second, we find the formula for the Flying Full-Back profile.
Among our fifteen Flying Full-Backs, twelve are above average in both metrics. No full-backs we did not consider as “Flying” rank above average in both metrics. Want to know the Flying Full-Back formula? You’ll find it in Physical and Penetration.
Flying Full-Backs to Exploit
In the top fifteen of our Flying Full-Back ranking, seven players are 25 or younger. We have singled them out to see where each one stands out.
In this table, scores are normalized from 0 to 1. They are compared with our global sample of full-backs in the J.League, and the weight percentages are not applied. The best player in the sample receives 1 and the worst 0. This simply shows which players have the most complete profiles and which ones focus on specific aspects.
Earlier, we highlighted three names—Hashimoto, Mochizuki, and Nono—who represent distinct Flying Full-Back profiles.
Hashimoto is a short, left-sided full-back with a light physique who stands out in Penetration and Production. He is the top full-back in the J.League in this category. His 10.3 score in our Crossing Efficiency metric is two points above the second-best, and his 0.17 expected assists per game is 40% higher than the next player within this metric.
In fact, we see that his Arrival score is lower than his Progression, indicating Hashimoto is a full-back who excels at finding teammates further up the pitch. He ranks 5th for progressive passes and progressive carries per game. At 25, he could make a very effective Flying Full-Back, even if he doesn’t have the physique to repeatedly perform high-intensity actions. However, he would likely fit well into a wide range of roles.
Although they may be similar types of full-backs, or close to it, Henry Mochizuki is a different player from Hashimoto. To start, Henry plays on the right and stands 1.92 meters tall. This Japanese international usually starts from deeper positions, taking advantage of his powerful stride, and, without having Hashimoto’s technical quality, uses strength and physical presence to arrive into dangerous areas. That's why he stands out in Arrival and Physical metrics.
In our Deep Progression metric—which counts the number of times a player reaches the final third while carrying the ball plus the times he receives it in that zone—Henry averages 7.34, the highest in the league. This is complemented by his 1.68 completed dribbles per game, the third-highest in the league.
Finally, Kimito Nono. He is probably the player showing the greatest imbalance between different attributes. He excels in Arrival and Physical metrics but is below average in Progression and Penetration. Nono relies on his physique for the areas in which he stands out.
Our Driblab Physical Score system—which incorporates all the physical metrics we track, not just those selected for this Index—gives Nono the highest score among J.League full-backs. He is the second full-back covering the most distance at HSR speed (above 19.8 km/h but below 25 km/h) and also the second covering the most distance in Sprints (above 25 km/h).
In conclusion, our Flying Full-Back Index highlights a variety of profiles within the same framework, each excelling in different aspects of the role. Whether it’s Hashimoto’s technical quality and precision, Mochizuki’s physical dominance and deep progressions, or Nono’s raw athleticism, these players demonstrate the diverse ways a Flying Full-Back can impact a team. By identifying and quantifying these attributes, clubs can make more informed decisions and potentially uncover undervalued talent capable of giving them a competitive edge.
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