Lauren Hemp is widely regarded as one of the most exciting young talents in world football at the moment. The 21-year-old has rapidly established herself as a vital part of the Manchester City and England Squad. So what does Hemp bring to a team and how does she rank compared to other forwards?
Hemp has been a star player for City since joining the Blues in 2018. The 21-year-old made the move to Manchester after spending 2 seasons with Bristol. The forward has also recently begun to make her mark on the international stage. With 6 goals in just 19 senior appearances, Hemp has already proven herself to be a threat for club and country.
Hemp may primarily act as a winger however City’s No.15 is also capable of playing through the middle. With 31 goal contributions in just 37 games, the 21-year-old was the Sky Blues’ top scorer for the 2021/22 domestic season. 21 goals and 10 assists throughout the campaign have proven Hemp to be a threat in more ways than one.
Lauren Hemp: Stats
Hemp’s attributes are widely known. Her speed and directness are an asset for any side the 21-year-old plays in.
Dribbles
We can see from the visual that on average Hemp completes approximately 2 dribbles per game. This places the 21-year-old in the 81st percentile of forwards in the WSL. This aspect of Hemp’s play is clearly visible when playing for Manchester City. The ability to take the ball beyond a defender is an asset that the Sky Blues frequently capitalise on. The dribbles that Hemp completes allow her team to quickly bring the ball into the box to provide City’s forwards goal-scoring opportunities.
In the video above you see a compilation of Hemp’s dribbles throughout the season in the WSL. As you can see she’s quite successful at attacking that wide left flank in the final third. Her combination of technically-gifted talent and being strong in the duels, make it very difficult to get her off the ball.
Lauren Hemp’s key passing
In the beeswarm plot above, you can see the key passing stats of Lauren Hemp in the WSL. They measure the passing stats that belong to a creative player, just like Hemp herself is. She is compared to her peers in attacking, both strikers and wingers.
In four of the six data metrics, she really is elite. In both the assisting metrics, key passes per 90 and passes to penalty area per 90 she does incredibly well. this shows how much she is involved in the final phase of the attacks. Where she doesn’t score high is the passes to the final third per 90, but that can be explained by the fact that she is already in the final third most of the time.
So how and where does she make these key passes? You can see that in the video below.
Shooting
From the graphic above we can see where the majority of Hemp’s shots come from. As we would expect, the shot map shows us that the forward’s attempts on goal typically come from the left of the goal. As Hemp spends the majority of her game time on the left wing this is to be expected. We can also see that most of the No.15’s goals come from inside the six-yard box to the left of the net.
This goal-scoring position allows Hemp the freedom to get beyond the opposition defenders in order to take a shot on goal. We can see that on average Hemp attempts more than 3 shots per game. She has generated an xG of 9,1 and scored 10 goals – meaning she is overperforming slightly with +0,9.
Comparisons
So how does Hemp compare to other WSL forwards?
Pernille Harder
From the radar graph, we can see how Hemp has compared to Harder over the past season. When we look at the metrics we see that Pernille Harder is better in the volume of shots per 90 and the xG per 90 generated, but in all other areas – Hemp is superior in the data.
Mead
In the radar graph, you can see the comparison between Hemp and Mead. Overall, Hemp scores higher than Mead, but Mead does very well in the goals and assists metrics. In the other metrics to do with possession, Hemp is clearly better.
Toone
In the graph above you see Hemp compared to Ella Toone from Manchester United. Again, Hemp is superior in most of the metrics, bar the assists per 90 and the shots per 90. As Toone is a great talent, it’s even more impressive how Hemp really is.
Final thoughts
Lauren Hemp is one of the greatest talents in the world and arguably England’s biggest talent. In our comparisons, we have seen that she isn’t just a great talent but also is better in some metrics than players who are more experienced on this level. With the Euros coming rapidly, it will be interesting to see how well she does there.
