How TackleZone rankings work (TAS, TMS, TDS, TGS & roles)

TackleZone rankings exist for one reason: most public football boards still treat every player like an attacker. Goals and assists are easy to love and easy to sort. They are also a terrible way to decide who had the better season at centre-back, defensive midfield, or in goal. This guide is the single place we explain how our scores are built — so you can trust a board, argue with it honestly, or link it when someone asks “what does TDS even mean?”

We run two related systems. Position scores — TAS, TMS, TDS, and TGS — sort the four API positions (Attacker, Midfielder, Defender, Goalkeeper) across Europe’s top five leagues. Role boards go further: eight tactical jobs (GK, CB, FB, CDM, CM, AM, WINGER, ST) assigned from lineups and scored inside each role. Use position boards for the big four tabs on Rankings; use role boards when the debate is “best pure striker” or “best number six,” not “best midfielder” as a blur.

Every completed-season score shares the same eligibility bar. A player needs about 900 minutes in the season block and an average rating of at least 6.8. We keep one spell per player — the club stint with the most minutes — so a mid-season transfer does not create two phantom leaders. Early in a new campaign we lower the minutes floor progressively (from roughly a full match upward) so boards stay usable without crowning a 20-minute cameo.

Scores are pool-normalised to 0–100. That means a component is scaled against everyone else who cleared eligibility in that position (or role), not against a fixed historic table. The leader on a metric sits near the top of that component; someone in the middle of the pack sits near 50. Labels such as Elite or World Class are bands on the final composite, not marketing stickers glued onto raw goals.

TAS — TackleZone Attacker Score — weights rating (40%), goals per 90 (35%), shots on target per 90 (15%), and conversion (10%). We deliberately dropped season goal totals after we saw them double-count volume with goals per 90 and stretch the board: one outlier season could pin 100 while the next elite finisher fell into the high 60s. TAS also winsorises each input to the 5th–95th percentile before min–max scaling, so a Kane-level spike cannot flatten everyone else into meaningless gaps.

TMS — Midfielder Score — is built for creators and engines in the same pool: rating (35%), key passes per 90 (25%), assists per 90 (15%), tackles plus interceptions per 90 (15%), and goals per 90 (10%). It will not perfectly separate a holding midfielder from a number ten — that is what CDM / CM / AM role boards are for — but it stops midfield rankings from being a goals table in disguise.

TDS — Defender Score — is rating-led (about half the composite) with duels won %, interceptions per 90, and aerial won % making up the rest. When aerial data is missing for a pool, that weight folds into duels so we do not invent headers. TDS is why stoppers can lead a public board without scoring from corners. If a name feels “too high,” open the profile: the component bars show whether rating, duels, or interceptions are doing the work.

TGS — Goalkeeper Score — blends rating (45%), save percentage (30%), and goals conceded per 90 inverted (25%). High save volume alone is not enough; a keeper behind a leaky defence can pad saves while shipping goals. Pairing save rate with conceded per 90 and rating keeps that trade-off visible. Like outfield scores, keepers still need the minutes and rating floors.

Role rankings answer a different question. Lineup grids and season slot shares assign each regular to a primary role. Plurality rules keep split-role creators (for example an AM who also logs CDM minutes) on the board when they clear a clear majority over a big sample. Each role then gets its own 0–100 score against peers in that role — so a winger is not punished for looking “worse” than a striker on a shared midfielder formula.

How to read a number in practice: compare within the same board and season. Kane at 100 TAS and Mbappé at ~96 on the same Top 5 attacker board is a tight race after winsorisation; it is not “Mbappé is average.” Schlotterbeck leading TDS does not mean van Dijk had a bad season — it means, in that pool and weighting, Schlotterbeck’s composite cleared first. Always check minutes, club context, and the component breakdown on the player page.

What we will not pretend: we do not invent xG, tracking data, or psychology labels. Underlying match and season stats come from API-Football; TackleZone adds eligibility, weights, normalisation, Compare verdicts, and boards like Clutch & Bottle. Feeds can lag after matchdays. If a figure looks wrong, send the URL via Contact — transparency beats a perfect façade.

Start on Rankings with the position tabs for TAS/TMS/TDS/TGS, switch to By role when the argument needs eight jobs instead of four, open a profile for the breakdown, and use Compare when two names dominate the chat. This page is the method; the boards are the evidence. If you only bookmark one TackleZone guide, make it this one.