Comparing Arjen Robben's 2014/15 Stats to His 2013/14 Numbers

Bayern Munich face a tricky opponent in Porto this week when they return to Champions League duty with the necessity of scoring at least two goals without return at the Allianz Arena on Tuesday night if they have any hope of progressing through to the next round. 

Pep Guardiola will undoubtedly begin feeling the stress of managing such a club and expectations ahead of the tie, but one particular factor will stand out as the real thorn in his side. Arjen Robben, Bayern's best player this season, will almost certainly miss the game and that could prove too costly to the German champions. 

The 31-year-old forward has always been an exceptional player wherever he's played—Chelsea, Real Madrid or indeed now at Bayern—but what we've seen of him this season is perhaps the best football the Dutch international has ever put on for show. 

When we take a look at his stats for this season—according to Transfermarkt—we find that he has scored 19 goals and provided 10 assists in just 29 games for Bayern over the course of this current campaign. It's been an exceptional effort that only adds to what he accomplished last season. 

The first thing that stands out between Robben's performances this season and the corresponding figures for last year is the sheer number of goals he's scored for Guardiola's team. 

Although he hasn't yet overtaken last season's 21 goals, it's almost a certainty that he will. It took him 45 games to hit 21 goals last year, yet this season he's already managed to bag 19 in 16 fewer games. 

Frank Augstein/Associated Press

Such a shift in his goalscoring talent is also clear for all to see when we break it down to how many minutes tend to stand between one goal and the next. Last season the Dutch international was scoring a goal for Bayern every 148 minutes; this year that figure has fallen to 114 minutes. As you may have calculated, that means Robben has taken a whole half hour off his minutes-per-goal ratio. 

There may, of course, be a number of reasons behind this improvement. Perhaps the most obvious was the shaky form of new striker Robert Lewandowski at the start of this season. That quickly shifted the responsibility to score goals from Bayern's main striker towards the wide players such as Thomas Muller and indeed Robben. 

This seems to be the case when we take a simple reading of the number of goals Bayern as a whole are scoring alongside Robben's own tally. Bayern tallied an impressive 94 goals over the course of the last Bundesliga season, and Robben weighed in with around 12 percent of the team's overall goals. Yet this season that figure has near enough doubled to 22 percent. 

Bayern aren't scoring more or fewer goals than they have done in the past, but this forward is certainly taking a larger chunk for himself. 

Yet there has been one caveat to Robben's new eye for goal: The Dutchman may be scoring more for Bayern, but unfortunately he doesn't seem to be creating as many opportunities for his teammates as he once did. 

Last season Robben bagged no fewer than 17 assists in 45 games for the club, yet that figure has dropped to 10 in 29 this season. As a result, his minutes per assist ratio has risen from 183 minutes per assist to 218. 

Perhaps this change is perfectly natural, considering his new, direct route to goal, but it certainly represents a complete shift in what the player does on the pitch for his team. For better or worse Robben seems to be much greedier on the ball and more likely to take a shot for himself rather than pass to one of his comrades in Bavarian red. 

Ultimately this matters little to fans, critics or indeed Guardiola, who would all agree that the forward is in the peak of his career. Robben is scoring more goals than ever in Munich these days, and as such he undoubtedly stands alongside the very best in European football right now. 

@Sbienkowski