The Premier League is home to some of the world's best right-backs.
Some of football's most talented full-backs have graced the Premier League, from Lee Dixon to Gary Neville to Kyle Walker and everyone in between.
But who are the standout right-backs right from?
With the 2024/25 season fast approaching, here are the best-performing right-backs in the Premier League ranked by their Squawka Score from last season. Only players with 1,710+ minutes (half of the possible minutes across the season) under their belts are considered.
For many seasons, Walker has been the gold standard among Premier League right-backs. There's a feeling Manchester City's number two is returning to his very best. Starting 30 Premier League matches in 2023/24, the City skipper is still going strong at 34-years-old and his ability to enter the opposition's final third and defend one-on-one consistently is what head coach Pep Guardiola admires the most.
He was named in both the EURO 2024 Team of the Tournament and the 2023 FIFA FIFPRO Men's World 11 and since leaving Tottenham has now won 17 trophies, including six Premier League titles.
Diogo Dalot's versatility has been crucial to Manchester United through their injury crisis, playing both right-back and left-back under Erik ten Hag. The Portuguese defender featured in 36 of United's 38 league matches in 2023/24, ranking in the top two for his side in tackles, interceptions, successful crosses, duels won and successful passes ending in the final third.
His performance against Spurs back in January saw him become the first full-back to contest 9+ duels and win every single one of them in a Premier League match last season.
It was another summer transfer spree for Chelsea, which brought in 12 players; six months earlier, Malo Gusto joined from Olympique Lyon before remaining on loan until the 2023/24 season. He regularly featured under Mauricio Pochettino before dipping in and out, but cemented that right-back berth in Reece James' absence. His performances, including three assists since Boxing Day, have been so encouraging that it's hard to see a healthy James usurping him when he finally returns under new boss Enzo Maresca.
Despite starting just 19 league games, he finished the season with six Premier League assists, the third most of any Chelsea player behind Cole Palmer (11) and Conor Gallagher (7) and racked up a top speed of an impressive 35km/h, the eighth highest of any U23 player in 2023/24.
Kieran Trippier has been a revelation since joining the Toon Army from Atletico Madrid in 2022, with his incredible set-piece deliveries and free-kick goals making him a valuable asset to Eddie Howe, becoming the first defender to provide 10+ assists in Europe's top five leagues in 2023/24.
Last season, the Magpies' skipper created more chances (65) than any other defender in the Premier League, also leading the way for accurate crosses (69), goal involvements (11) and assists (10).
Despite a few problems towards the end of the season, Trippier still had a fantastic season and teammate Jacob Murphy -- who often shares the right flank with Trippier -- believes the England international is getting better as he ages.
"A fine wine! One of the best right-backs in the world," Murphy told Premier League Productions.
Manager Eddie Howe is very familiar with Trippier having worked with him previously at Burnley before their Newcastle days. It'll come as no surprise how highly Howe rates Trippier among the players he's signed during his managerial career.
"I think he's one of my best-ever signings," Howe said following Trippier's hat-trick of assists in the 8-0 win over Sheffield United. "I've signed him twice, and I'm delighted to have been able to sign a player of his quality twice in my career.
"I signed him very early on at Burnley, and straight away his delivery and crossing ability were the best I'd seen, whether from a static ball, a set-play or a moving ball. He sets the tone for us. His mentality is excellent, his desire to win, he never stops. That's why he leads the team so well."
If we were taking Championship scores into consideration, then Kyle Walker-Peters would have come in at number three in our right-back rankings, but it would be unfair to include him. Instead, after helping the Saints gain promotion back to the top flight, we thought we would still give him his flowers after an impressive campaign.
The now 27-year-old made 46 league appearances in 2023/24, providing four assists and scoring two goals. and becoming the only defender to make more than 70 tackles and be dribbled past fewer than 20 times.
Pedro Porro has been a huge attacking threat for Tottenham since his move from Sporting CP, scoring six goals and providing 10 assists in 50 Premier League appearances. Now playing as an inverted full-back with the freedom to attack at will under Ange Postecoglou, his numbers have continued to improve.
He finished the 2023/24 league season as just one of two defenders alongside Kieran Trippier to be directly involved in 10+ goals and became the first ever Tottenham defender to provide seven assists in a single Premier League campaign.
SkySports pundit and Tottenham fan Michael Bridge recently named Porro as Spurs' most important player on his Optus Sport Podcast.
"When I look at how Spurs are playing at this moment in time, the standout performer for me, and you can talk about other players and things that are going on, is Pedro Porro. He has been absolutely outstanding, his stats are through the roof, the way he has transformed his game under Ange Postecoglou, it shows when you have a player with pedigree and Ange works with them and gives them a new lease of life." he raved.
The Spaniard also had more shots than any other defender and made more tackles than any other right-back last season.
Trent Alexander-Arnold excelled in 2023/24 in the new role he was given by now former manager Jurgen Klopp. The 25-year-old had made more successful passes into the final third than any other outfield player before his injury in February, also playing the joint most through balls of any player in that time.
Since 2017/18, TAA is the only defender to create 100+ chances in the Premier League, also leading defenders for the most passes into the opposition box, the most big chances created, the most assists and the most goals from outside the box. He also has the second most assists by a defender in Premier League history, just one behind teammate Andy Robertson on 59 and still holds the record for the most assists ever provided by a defender in a single Premier League campaign (13).
We used Twenty3 Sport's Discovery Tool to run a customised search. The Discovery Tool rates a player's per 90 output in the metrics detailed below to produce a percentage score, referred to above as the Squawka Score.
Each player's stats are compared to the average output of strikers across the past three seasons of big-five European league football. The higher the score, the closer they rank to the 95th percentile and above for each metric.
We also weighted each stat from 1 to 5 to highlight the most important aspects of a striker's play style, with five being the most important.
Here are the metrics used and weighting given to each metric to come up with the overall Squawka Score:
To be awarded a score, a player must have reached the automatically calculated minutes threshold, in this case, 1,710 minutes in the Premier League during 2023/24.
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