Squad churn: whose team changed the most in the big European leagues?

How many minutes were lost by each team in the Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, Ligue 1 and the Bundesliga?

Apologies for the lull in activity since the last post, but as the data from the new season starts to accumulate I’ll be able to switch on more of the classic visualisations and hopefully add some new stuff into the mix.

Before that happens, let’s lock down final versions of the squad churn graphics that I put out a month ago, now that the transfer window has closed.

In case you’re not familiar with these, each team is summarised by a donut chart in which individual segments represent a player’s minutes from last season. These are ordered from most to fewest minutes and sized accordingly, with departed players faded out. This allows us to see not just whose squad has been shaken up the most, but also how far up the pecking order the leavers were.

Premier League

When we first looked at the English top flight back in mid-July, more than half of the clubs still retained at least 90% of their 2023-24 league minutes. This has now dropped substantially, with only four teams still clearing this bar. Unsurprisingly they’re all among the league’s richest: Liverpool, Newcastle, Arsenal and Manchester City. In fact the only departee from any of these teams who was one of their manager’s 11 most-used players last season is Julián Álvarez.

Chelsea’s busy summer has resulted in them being the most-changed Premier League team and the only one to have lost four of last season’s most-used 11. Conor Gallagher and Thiago Silva have found new clubs while Ðorđe Petrović and Raheem Sterling have been loaned out.

While Crystal Palace successfully held onto Marc Guéhi, they ended up having one of the highest levels of churn in the division after two of their three most-used players departed: Joachim Andersen to Fulham and Jordan Ayew to Leicester. Bournemouth are the only other Premier League side to have lost more than one of their top three, with Dominic Solanke and Neto both moving to North London.

La Liga

In the top tier of Spanish football, Athletic Club are the only team to retain all of their most-used 11 players from last season, along with the next six for good measure. Despite finishing just above the relegation zone, Rayo Vallecano haven’t changed much (besides losing their first-choice goalkeeper) so could well struggle again.

Real Betis are the only team in any of the five leagues covered here who have lost seven of their 11 most-used players from 2023-24. They’re one of only two La Liga clubs to have seen more than half of last season’s minutes depart, but the other (Villarreal) has mostly seen fringe players depart.

Newly-promoted Real Valladolid are now without four of their five most-used players from last term, which may have contributed to their harrowing 0-7 defeat by Barcelona this weekend.

Serie A

Over in Italy we have a team that has gone one better than Athletic Club and kept hold of their 18 most-used players. Despite spending €70m this summer, defending champions Inter have retained the most minutes of any side in Serie A, which will surely mean fewer appearances for some of last season’s regulars.

The league’s other mostly-unchanged team is another champion. Parma won Serie B last season and kept their team largely intact, unlike fellow promoted side Como who have lost four of their seven most-used players.

Empoli narrowly avoided relegation last season and have since lost over 60% of their minutes (including four of their five most-used players), giving them the most churn of any team in the “big five” leagues.

Meanwhile Verona are a bit of an unusual case, not just within Serie A but across all these divisions. They’ve seen a lot of churn, with almost half of last season’s minutes departing, but the core of their squad has remained intact: only one of their 10 most-utilised players is no longer there (loanee Michael Folorunsho).

Bundesliga

German champions Leverkusen have managed to keep the bulk of their title-winning squad together, with the two biggest departures being loan-related (one returning to their parent club and another farmed out).

While Dortmund have rung the changes after a disappointing fifth-placed finish, most of the departures have been around the fringes of the team. Niclas Füllkrug was signed by West Ham, while veterans Marco Reus and Mats Hummels (both 35 years old) were allowed to move on.

Despite a disappointing mid-table finish last season (following two consecutive Europa League qualifications), Freiburg have opted not to shake things up: they’ve lost a smaller share of minutes than any team covered here except Liverpool.

Ligue 1

In France we have another promoted team that looks to be keeping the faith with the players who took them up. Auxerre have only lost one of their first-team regulars from last season: winger Gauthier Hein has dropped back into Ligue 2 with Metz.

At the other end of the graphic, Marseille’s extensive summer spending has mostly been covered by exits, with seven of their 12 most frequently-deployed players from 2023-24 moving on. Only Rennes, who generated €135m in sales, will look less familiar on the pitch this season.

Next steps

There will be a separate post soon analysing the squad churn graphics across the three EFL divisions, hopefully with a bit of a twist.

As I mentioned at the outset, this should be followed by a lot more stuff in the weeks and months ahead as data from the new season continues to accumulate.