Leicester choose Fofana’s replacement – here we go

Faes is a centre-back through and through. Although in his whole career, the player has been involved as a DM and a right-back, those appearances were few and far between. Reims’ defender is certainly a right-sided defender who seldom plays anywhere else.

Beyond this, the player is stylistically confusing. According to SmarterScout‘s ratings of him against Premier League players as a RCB, the Belgian scores 83/100 on attacking output, 98 on receiving in the opposition box, and 88 on tendency to dribble.

However, Faes only scores 11/100 on disruption, 7/100 on defensive quantity, and 14 for tendency towards aerial duels. Those are very weird stylistic ratings: a strong attacker who makes less defensive actions comparatively with other central defenders.

Context is always critical to understanding these stats. What they really mean is that Faes is more like Jonny Evans in his decision-making: a preference not to tackle, not to pressure, but instead just to block. In effect, when he does make an action, it is effective. Interestingly, despite being considered in the seventh percentile on aerial duels won according to FB Ref, the player did score three of his four Ligue 1 goals in the 21/22 season via headers.