Would be a smart signing imo. He's a high volume passer, shows a lot of composure on the ball, adds technical security in the deeper build up phase and can occupy the central centre back (CCB) role in a 3 man back-line in build up. His long passing ranks in the 99th percentile for passes attempted/completed and there was a reason Fiorentina ranked among the best teams in the league at keeping possession with players like Amrabat. It's a smart signing on a possible low fee for a player that we don't have in midfield.
With Casemiro, Eriksen, Amrabat and Mainoo, that's a good variety of players to have in the first phase of midfield. Then in advanced midfield positions we have Bruno, Mount and possibly Hannibal.
That should hopefully open up the opportunity for us to go big on a midfielder and CB in the following summer. A midfielder who is the controller type with the ability to pass through the lines, evade pressure comfortably whilst also having the out of possession game to control opposition transitions. With the CB we also require someone who ticks the boxes when it comes to in-possession but out of possession I feel we should target someone who has the pace, power and athleticism to go along with the ability on the ball.
Taking very selective stats rather than looking at a bigger, or whole picture is something you can do for any player to make them look twice as good as they actually are.
We had the same thing in the past with Lindelof. Oh look at this, the CB who has been beaten the least by a dribble in the league! ... Because he only tried to tackle and win the ball if he was almost guaranteed to win it and was for the most part running away towards his own goal backing off. He would attempt half as many tackles as other CBs and people were taking this stat seriously.
When people give 1 or 2 stats and dont give a proper spread of them its to create a false impression on purpose.
2.3 tackles at the world cup is a completely normal amount for someone in his position. However when you factor in that Morocco averaged 38.4% of the ball. Thats the 6th least of the tournament, or 27th from the top. You would think that your defensive midfielders would win the ball an above average amount in that scenario with all the defending you are doing for the vast majority of the game. Its not like its a bad number, its just he's in the perfect position to do lots of that and its not a high amount.
As an example Bruno and Casemiro both average 3.3 tackles a game so far this season and we average 54% of the ball. McTom averaged 2.5 tackles per 90 mins last season, Fred 3.4 and we had 53.8% of the ball.
They talk about Amrabat's improved clearances. Great. That was the 9th most in the team, their striker En Nesyri had the same amount. They were a team that had very little of the ball and had loads of players back in their box clearing the ball out, while some players like Amrabat ran around outside the box to put in a few tackles and put some pressure on the ball. And then Ounahi would carry the ball forward well with little end product and En Nesyri was the only player able to score more than 1 goal in the tournament. They were a very limited team who showed resilliancy defending as deep as possible. Thats not how we play. Thats how Luton are going to have to play
I dont have much frame of reference for "pressure regains". Not many websites carry that stat. Im not sure I know exactly what is meant by it. Morocco averaged 19.6 clearances a game which is the 12th most of the 32 teams. So thats plenty of cleared balls to chase after and compete for. Obviously a lot more than any of the good teams. Belgium had 18, that might be a good indication of why they were knocked out in the group stages in Morocco's group. You wouldnt expect a good team to have to clear that amount of balls out of their own box on a regular basis.
