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Chalkboard of the week – the winners!

You've presented your offerings, we've picked the most likely Oscar winners from our new statistical movie theatre
A genius with a chalkboard. Just like your average Guardian reader, really. Photograph: Corbis

Another week, another incredibly large number of chalkboards created on our spectacularly inventive new chalkboard-creation tool. And slowly, we are discovering how best to use this new tool to: a) solve our tactical arguments, and b) win a signed Premier League shirt. Here's our pick of the best we could find, with the winners chosen by Opta's Duncan Alexander.

Now it's just my opinion, but I don't believe that any effort I've seen so far, and I think I've personally looked at about 700, has proved that one player is better than another player. They can prove that one player has made more passes/tackles/interceptions than another player over the course of one game or part of one game, but that's not the same thing. If you're even going to attempt to prove such a complex case using a single chalkboard, at least make sure the players you're comparing were both on the pitch for the same amount of time. cbmufc's point here is undermined by the fact that the underperforming Xabi Alonso only came off the bench for the last 10 minutes, while in this one leonhole hasn't noticed that Dirk Kuyt only played for the last half-hour (we looked it up, and Benayoun made only eight passes in the time Kuyt was on the field).

This would appear to prove that Heurelho Gomes is a firm devotee of the long-ball game, while Carlo Cudicini prefers the tippy-tappy stuff, but I find it hard to believe that such a stark contrast did not start with a managerial instruction.

Now here's a funny thing. domoeshea, a man who doesn't want too many words to distract us from a decent chalkboard, has compared Fulham's passing under Lawrie Sanchez with that this season under Roy Hodgson, looking at two away matches against Wigan. The big difference: these days there's much less hoofing from the keeper, passes are concentrated down the wings and there are a lot more of them (119 more passes completed in the Hodgson game). It's interesting stuff (as normal, hiding the numbers helps), and enough for him to carry away this week's third prize (more of an honorary thing, really, he doesn't actually get a prize).

 by Guardian Chalkboards

So teams are better when they pass more and hoof less, then. Or are they? Compare that with this comparison of two Aston Villa matches at West Ham a similar period apart, created by onelandtaylor. Obviously they're now much more successful than they were then, but there's a lot less passing going on, and a lot more hoofing from the keeper. Weird.

 by Guardian Chalkboards

Villa's transformation this season has had a lot of readers reaching for their chalkboard-creation software, and JamesieClark has run away with this week's runner-up award by demonstrating how Stillian Petrov's role has changed as Martin O'Neill has changed his tactics:

Key to Villa's improvement: Stillian Petrov has taken up a defensive midfield role, with safe, secure passing rather than the ambitious but ultimately unsuccessful passing he was attempting, allowing the creative midfield talents of Villa's team (Young, Milner) to do the talking when supporting the front men going forward. Petrov sits behind the back four in a Makelele style role, controlling possession for his team

The chalkboards have also proved good at revealing the weird little anomalies that make this sport so hard to fathom and easy to love. Take, for example, Balhead's discovery that Arsenal appeared to do much more attacking in the game where they lost 2-1 to Hull than when they beat the same team 3-1. Others provided decent evidence to suggest that a player might prefer one position to another – say, Damien Duff being happier on the left than the right, or Mikel Arteta blossoming when moved to the middle (a point made identically by anthonyjevans and MouthoftheMersey).

But scooping the top prize this week, and the only prize that actually comes with a prize, is drOstrowski, who found something good in Rafa Benítez's tactical tweaking for last weekend's visit to Portsmouth.

Benítez's decision to play three central defenders at Portsmouth was controversial, but had its advantages. With the fullbacks pegging back Portsmouth's wide men, Carragher was able to effectively start Liverpool's attacks by distributing the ball to Agger and Skrtel, who were usually unmarked. Compared to a "classic" ball-playing defender like Rio Ferdinand, Carragher managed both a higher number of passes and a better (perfect, in fact) completion rate

 by Guardian Chalkboards

"The top two show good analysis of players' differing roles within the tactical system imposed by their managers," explained Duncan Alexander of his decision-making, "while the third shows how much a manager dictates a team's style of play and what this can do to that team's league position over a period of time."

So there you go. Keep on chalking, there's another signed shirt up for grabs next week and a lot of cool information (plus the occasional weird anomaly) still to be discovered. If I could ask you one quick favour, though – if you're scrolling through everyone's chalkboards and you see something cool, or even if you think you've created such a thing yourself, could I kindly ask that you let me know? Really, you're too kind.

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