After an up and down season, Newcastle all but confirmed Premier League football again for next season thanks to a great 1-0 win away at Leicester City on Friday night.
It was their fourth league clean sheet since the turn of the year and perhaps the most important. Notably though, despite an underwhelming league campaign, Newcastle can still boast the seventh-best defence in the Premier League.
A key component to that defensive robustness has been the influence of Swiss defender Fabian Schar . The 27-year-old has been a hit since his arrival to St James’ Park last summer from Deportivo for the relatively small fee of just £3million.
In the league games featuring Schar this season, Newcastle have conceded an average of just 0.89 goals per 90 minutes. That betters United's season average of 1.26 goals conceded per 90 minutes by some distance.
He has thrived within Benitez’s three-man centre back system alongside Florian Lejeune and Jamal Lascelles. All three have formed a solid collaboration and work in cohesion to limit the opposition's threat.
There is no doubt he has proven capable in dealing with most threats that come his way, whether that be in the air - posting a solid aerial duel success rate of 47.1% - or with his impressive his ability to step up into opposition passes to cut out brewing danger.
This season, that ability to read and intercept the ball has proven most imposing.
For centre-backs who have played 20 Premier League matches or more this season, he ranks second behind only Southampton’s Jan Bednarek for the most interceptions per 90 minutes, averaging 8.66.
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Not just clever in reading the ball, he also averages an impressive 1.3 progressive runs per 90 minutes.
As a result, he has built a reputation of stepping forward with the ball and being confident in dribbling past the opposition. He also possess the quality in his locker to thread line breaking passes forward for his side.
It was of course his possession that led to the winning goal against the Foxes on Friday night.
Below is a table of both Schar and Bednarek compared to some of the Premier League’s other highly rated centre-backs this season.
Noticeably, Schar and Bednarek are bettering the above elite personal by some distance. Although there is a fair caveat in that the ‘top’ sides in the league spend less time defending then those below, it is still a testament to both players to be performing so impressively.
Additionally, it is visible is that although Bednarek can marginally better Schar in terms of interceptions per 90 minutes, he manages significantly fewer progressive runs per 90 minutes than the Swiss defender at 0.44.
Both traits together highlight an ability to quickly transition his side from a defensive set-up into an attacking one. This was demonstrated in Newcastle’s victory against Leicester on Friday night.
A line breaking ball is looking to be played into the feet of Harvey Barnes; five yards from the attacker situated in that defensive back-three, Schar is primed to close to threat down.
The 27-year-old closes the space swiftly and intercepts the intended pass to Barnes.
Rather than clearing the ball aimlessly once in possession, he illustrates composure by progressing the ball forward and playing a neat one two in the centre of the pitch.
One of the success stories in a largely underwhelming campaign for Newcastle has most certainly been their defence.
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When the attack has often been mis-firing, their sturdiness at the back has managed to secure important results from difficult situations.
A key man in all of that has been the Swiss star. His solid season so far was capped off by perhaps his performance of the campaign at the King Power.
The £3m investment on the player has already proved wise and he looks to set to be a mainstay in the Newcastle defence for plenty of seasons to come.
