An analytical assessment of league one this season


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Looks like someone has had some 6 sigma training and has access to minitab. Not sure what the hypothesis is that he’s actually testing is though. Just looks like a load of data dumped into minitab and he’s rambling on about the charts compared to his expectations.
 
They are punters, not statisticians. That just reflects where the money is going.
Is it simply laying off against the money already bet or is there also a strategic element from their own predictions built in ?
If, in-house, they believe in a certain outcome it would be sensible to discourage more money going on it.
Don't know, just guessing.
 
Afternoon all,

I noticed my article had picked up a fair amount of clicks through your site so I thought I'd check it out. It seems I've struck a nerve. Thanks to the few of you who found it interesting, apologies to those of you who felt their time had been wasted and thought it was "a load of bollocks", and other adjectives.

If you would give me just a couple more minutes I'd like to try and clarify some things. Believe me I'm not going to try and convince you to come around to my way of thinking and I also, for the record, do not believe that I am 100% right but there's been some interesting points raised in this thread that weren't fully explained in the article so I thought maybe if I offered more explanation then it might make more sense. I'll try and be brief but address some of the points raised.

By the way, I completely appreciate this way of looking at football isn't for everyone so please feel free to ignore this and carry on throwing pelters my way.

1) What is Expected Goals?
So, everytime a player takes a shot, it has a probability of going in. That's not me being mathsy or nerdy, it's just truth. Everytime a player picks up the ball, cuts inside and shoots from the edge of the area, there's a probability of that shot becoming a goal. Everytime a player is played in behind the defence and is through one on one, that also has a probability of becoming a goal. More likely than the shot from the edge of the area, right? Every shot is unique, but shots that have similar factors about them (i.e the location the shot was taken from, the body part used to strike the ball, positioning of defenders between ball and goal, etc) can be grouped together and you can use the average conversion rates to predict the likelihood of future shots going in. Over large samples, you can then say "well this is how many goals we would expected team X to score based on the shots they've taken" and vice versa for conceded. It's not perfect and it's not definite. When I say that Chris Maguire's goal against Southend had about a 3% chance of going in, that's because in simple terms shots from that distance have gone in 3 times out of 100 historically. That's not to say it was *exactly* 3%, it's just the most likely estimation we have based on the information we have.

Expected Goals is mostly used in gambling by bettors and bookmakers to benchmark teams ability but is also used within club boardrooms and in recruitment and analysis departments to analyse other teams and players.

2) Why is it important?
If you're still with me reading this then I'm glad you're keeping an open mind to this. I'm sure most of you would agree that creating more chances and better chances than your opponents on a regular basis is an important factor in generating good runs of results. Studies show that it is (currently) the best method of predicting future performance in smaller samples - better than number of shots taken, possession, goals scored, everything. It correlates well with points and goals scored and conceded though not every time - as is the case with Sunderland. That's also the point of using analysis like this though - if it lined up perfectly with the goals tallies of each team, what would be the point of it? The point of it is to raise questions about whether a team is getting "lucky or unlucky" in simplistic terms and do more research. Sometimes, there'll be good reasons as to why a team looks like an outlier. Other times, it really is the case that they may have just been getting lucky or unlucky over a run of fixtures.

3) Does Sunderland being 11th for Expected Goal Difference mean Sunderland aren't good?

No it doesn't, but is does suggest they aren't as good as other teams in the league at creating good chances regularly, and also aren't as good as other teams in the league at preventing chances. However, there are many reasons why it doesn't have to mean that Sunderland aren't good. One is that every model is flawed and a lot of you are completely right to point out that it matters which players the chances fall to and that Sunderland as a team might have better finishers than the rest of the league. Two is that there is other context sometimes missing that is only clear once digging even deeper. Someone mentioned that you've had played with 10 men quite often this season. Valid point. Another is that you've also not been playing with your strongest team for a lot of the season because of injuries. There are things like that that I haven't included because that's information I'd use after looking at the model to contextualise it. Hopefully you can all see that whilst Sunderland stick out, most of the other teams in the league are benchmarked fairly well.

For what it's worth, I've seen Sunderland 3 times this season (vs Luton, Shrewsbury, and Southend). In none of those games would I say Sunderland were obviously the better side in terms of chances created. I'd say that the games were all pretty balanced overall but then you've just scored your chances whilst other teams have missed theirs. Call it clinical finishing, call it killer instinct, call it whatever you want. The point is to imagine what if you had missed those chances, or what if your opponents had converted theirs. You may disagree with me on that if you want.

4) Should a model like this feature player ability?
Yeah, ideally it would. It's very hard to incorporate this for a number of reasons though. I can't just say Josh Maja is a good finisher because he's only taken 20 shots in League One this season. It would take a helluva lot more shots to statistically prove that he was an above average finisher. For the record, he's scored 9 goals from 20 shots this season which is really good, but also a better conversion rate than Messi over Messi's entire career. If you want to argue with me than Maja is a better finisher than Messi then fair play but I'd respectfully disagree. To be clear, I'm absolutely not saying that finishing skill does not exist - obviously some players are better finishers than others. It's just than in Expected Goals, that's something you'd take into account when forming your analysis. I don't think Sunderland are *that* much better finishers than the rest of the league though, because there are plenty of other good players and good goalkeepers in the league that don't play for Sunderland.

By the way, if you want an idea of the work that has to go into quantifying finishing skill, then please google search "Statsbomb quantifying finishing skill" and read the first article. Though if you hated my piece, you'll probably spontaneously combust when reading that.


5) Why does everyone love Barnsley?
I noticed a few people suggest that I said Barnsley were the best team in the league in the article, which I didn't at any point - I literally said they're on a downward trend. But, for what it's worth, from the eye test Barnsley *are* the best side I've seen play against Luton (I'm a Luton fan) this season. I've also watched them in several other games (as I have a job that requires me to watch a lot of League One) and they've also absolutely dominated teams in those games to a degree that I haven't seen from another League One side this season. It's just my opinion, you're allowed to feel differently. From the numbers used in my piece, they profiled as the best side in the league up until a couple of weeks ago. Using other measurements, as someone posted just now you might notice that Barnsley are now virtually level with Sunderland in the bookmakers eyes, despite Sunderland being heavily favoured over them prior to the season. That's despite Sunderland being above Barnsley in the table. Either Barnsley are performing better than the bookmakers thought they would do prior to the season kick off, or Sunderland are performing worse. In my opinion, it's both, again you're entitled to your own thoughts on that.

Anyway, as I said I know not everyone enjoys deeper analysis of football and do not like what I had to say in the article. Some of you probably don't like what I've had to say in this post either. That's fair enough, everyone's entitled to watch and think about football in whatever way they please. For me personally, my profession requires me to look at the things mentioned in the article and think about fooball in a similar way to what was written. One last point I'd like to reiterate is that I do not think that was was in the article is 100% fact and nothing else matters. It's missing some context, but I wasn't about to give 1000 words on every team and why they may look good or not so good by these measures and hopefully you'll forgive me for that and appreciate that you're the only club who I've gone to greater lengths for to offer an explanation! Fans of other clubs, such as Peterborough who I cast in a similar light, have actually told me that what I've said matches with what they've seen with their own eyes. It's interesting that the vast majority of you don't feel that way about Sunderland.

Good luck for the rest of the season. Everyone knows you shouldn't be in this division and aren't likely to be in it for long so please don't let an article written by a "nerd" ruin any of the enjoyment you've had so far.
 
We’ve been absolutely dog shit in the last four games, that dominance over teams, as well and truly gone, and it won’t be back until mid January.
 
Afternoon all,

I noticed my article had picked up a fair amount of clicks through your site so I thought I'd check it out. It seems I've struck a nerve. Thanks to the few of you who found it interesting, apologies to those of you who felt their time had been wasted and thought it was "a load of bollocks", and other adjectives.

If you would give me just a couple more minutes I'd like to try and clarify some things. Believe me I'm not going to try and convince you to come around to my way of thinking and I also, for the record, do not believe that I am 100% right but there's been some interesting points raised in this thread that weren't fully explained in the article so I thought maybe if I offered more explanation then it might make more sense. I'll try and be brief but address some of the points raised.

By the way, I completely appreciate this way of looking at football isn't for everyone so please feel free to ignore this and carry on throwing pelters my way.

1) What is Expected Goals?
So, everytime a player takes a shot, it has a probability of going in. That's not me being mathsy or nerdy, it's just truth. Everytime a player picks up the ball, cuts inside and shoots from the edge of the area, there's a probability of that shot becoming a goal. Everytime a player is played in behind the defence and is through one on one, that also has a probability of becoming a goal. More likely than the shot from the edge of the area, right? Every shot is unique, but shots that have similar factors about them (i.e the location the shot was taken from, the body part used to strike the ball, positioning of defenders between ball and goal, etc) can be grouped together and you can use the average conversion rates to predict the likelihood of future shots going in. Over large samples, you can then say "well this is how many goals we would expected team X to score based on the shots they've taken" and vice versa for conceded. It's not perfect and it's not definite. When I say that Chris Maguire's goal against Southend had about a 3% chance of going in, that's because in simple terms shots from that distance have gone in 3 times out of 100 historically. That's not to say it was *exactly* 3%, it's just the most likely estimation we have based on the information we have.

Expected Goals is mostly used in gambling by bettors and bookmakers to benchmark teams ability but is also used within club boardrooms and in recruitment and analysis departments to analyse other teams and players.

2) Why is it important?
If you're still with me reading this then I'm glad you're keeping an open mind to this. I'm sure most of you would agree that creating more chances and better chances than your opponents on a regular basis is an important factor in generating good runs of results. Studies show that it is (currently) the best method of predicting future performance in smaller samples - better than number of shots taken, possession, goals scored, everything. It correlates well with points and goals scored and conceded though not every time - as is the case with Sunderland. That's also the point of using analysis like this though - if it lined up perfectly with the goals tallies of each team, what would be the point of it? The point of it is to raise questions about whether a team is getting "lucky or unlucky" in simplistic terms and do more research. Sometimes, there'll be good reasons as to why a team looks like an outlier. Other times, it really is the case that they may have just been getting lucky or unlucky over a run of fixtures.

3) Does Sunderland being 11th for Expected Goal Difference mean Sunderland aren't good?

No it doesn't, but is does suggest they aren't as good as other teams in the league at creating good chances regularly, and also aren't as good as other teams in the league at preventing chances. However, there are many reasons why it doesn't have to mean that Sunderland aren't good. One is that every model is flawed and a lot of you are completely right to point out that it matters which players the chances fall to and that Sunderland as a team might have better finishers than the rest of the league. Two is that there is other context sometimes missing that is only clear once digging even deeper. Someone mentioned that you've had played with 10 men quite often this season. Valid point. Another is that you've also not been playing with your strongest team for a lot of the season because of injuries. There are things like that that I haven't included because that's information I'd use after looking at the model to contextualise it. Hopefully you can all see that whilst Sunderland stick out, most of the other teams in the league are benchmarked fairly well.

For what it's worth, I've seen Sunderland 3 times this season (vs Luton, Shrewsbury, and Southend). In none of those games would I say Sunderland were obviously the better side in terms of chances created. I'd say that the games were all pretty balanced overall but then you've just scored your chances whilst other teams have missed theirs. Call it clinical finishing, call it killer instinct, call it whatever you want. The point is to imagine what if you had missed those chances, or what if your opponents had converted theirs. You may disagree with me on that if you want.

4) Should a model like this feature player ability?
Yeah, ideally it would. It's very hard to incorporate this for a number of reasons though. I can't just say Josh Maja is a good finisher because he's only taken 20 shots in League One this season. It would take a helluva lot more shots to statistically prove that he was an above average finisher. For the record, he's scored 9 goals from 20 shots this season which is really good, but also a better conversion rate than Messi over Messi's entire career. If you want to argue with me than Maja is a better finisher than Messi then fair play but I'd respectfully disagree. To be clear, I'm absolutely not saying that finishing skill does not exist - obviously some players are better finishers than others. It's just than in Expected Goals, that's something you'd take into account when forming your analysis. I don't think Sunderland are *that* much better finishers than the rest of the league though, because there are plenty of other good players and good goalkeepers in the league that don't play for Sunderland.

By the way, if you want an idea of the work that has to go into quantifying finishing skill, then please google search "Statsbomb quantifying finishing skill" and read the first article. Though if you hated my piece, you'll probably spontaneously combust when reading that.


5) Why does everyone love Barnsley?
I noticed a few people suggest that I said Barnsley were the best team in the league in the article, which I didn't at any point - I literally said they're on a downward trend. But, for what it's worth, from the eye test Barnsley *are* the best side I've seen play against Luton (I'm a Luton fan) this season. I've also watched them in several other games (as I have a job that requires me to watch a lot of League One) and they've also absolutely dominated teams in those games to a degree that I haven't seen from another League One side this season. It's just my opinion, you're allowed to feel differently. From the numbers used in my piece, they profiled as the best side in the league up until a couple of weeks ago. Using other measurements, as someone posted just now you might notice that Barnsley are now virtually level with Sunderland in the bookmakers eyes, despite Sunderland being heavily favoured over them prior to the season. That's despite Sunderland being above Barnsley in the table. Either Barnsley are performing better than the bookmakers thought they would do prior to the season kick off, or Sunderland are performing worse. In my opinion, it's both, again you're entitled to your own thoughts on that.

Anyway, as I said I know not everyone enjoys deeper analysis of football and do not like what I had to say in the article. Some of you probably don't like what I've had to say in this post either. That's fair enough, everyone's entitled to watch and think about football in whatever way they please. For me personally, my profession requires me to look at the things mentioned in the article and think about fooball in a similar way to what was written. One last point I'd like to reiterate is that I do not think that was was in the article is 100% fact and nothing else matters. It's missing some context, but I wasn't about to give 1000 words on every team and why they may look good or not so good by these measures and hopefully you'll forgive me for that and appreciate that you're the only club who I've gone to greater lengths for to offer an explanation! Fans of other clubs, such as Peterborough who I cast in a similar light, have actually told me that what I've said matches with what they've seen with their own eyes. It's interesting that the vast majority of you don't feel that way about Sunderland.

Good luck for the rest of the season. Everyone knows you shouldn't be in this division and aren't likely to be in it for long so please don't let an article written by a "nerd" ruin any of the enjoyment you've had so far.
To summarise
League One Table - Football - BBC Sport

Total goals for 32. Second in the division

Total goals against 13 top of the division

Goal difference +19 Top of the division

Actual position 2nd

All the above is supposition, not based on reality
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Afternoon all,

I noticed my article had picked up a fair amount of clicks through your site so I thought I'd check it out. It seems I've struck a nerve. Thanks to the few of you who found it interesting, apologies to those of you who felt their time had been wasted and thought it was "a load of bollocks", and other adjectives.

If you would give me just a couple more minutes I'd like to try and clarify some things. Believe me I'm not going to try and convince you to come around to my way of thinking and I also, for the record, do not believe that I am 100% right but there's been some interesting points raised in this thread that weren't fully explained in the article so I thought maybe if I offered more explanation then it might make more sense. I'll try and be brief but address some of the points raised.

By the way, I completely appreciate this way of looking at football isn't for everyone so please feel free to ignore this and carry on throwing pelters my way.

1) What is Expected Goals?
So, everytime a player takes a shot, it has a probability of going in. That's not me being mathsy or nerdy, it's just truth. Everytime a player picks up the ball, cuts inside and shoots from the edge of the area, there's a probability of that shot becoming a goal. Everytime a player is played in behind the defence and is through one on one, that also has a probability of becoming a goal. More likely than the shot from the edge of the area, right? Every shot is unique, but shots that have similar factors about them (i.e the location the shot was taken from, the body part used to strike the ball, positioning of defenders between ball and goal, etc) can be grouped together and you can use the average conversion rates to predict the likelihood of future shots going in. Over large samples, you can then say "well this is how many goals we would expected team X to score based on the shots they've taken" and vice versa for conceded. It's not perfect and it's not definite. When I say that Chris Maguire's goal against Southend had about a 3% chance of going in, that's because in simple terms shots from that distance have gone in 3 times out of 100 historically. That's not to say it was *exactly* 3%, it's just the most likely estimation we have based on the information we have.

Expected Goals is mostly used in gambling by bettors and bookmakers to benchmark teams ability but is also used within club boardrooms and in recruitment and analysis departments to analyse other teams and players.

2) Why is it important?
If you're still with me reading this then I'm glad you're keeping an open mind to this. I'm sure most of you would agree that creating more chances and better chances than your opponents on a regular basis is an important factor in generating good runs of results. Studies show that it is (currently) the best method of predicting future performance in smaller samples - better than number of shots taken, possession, goals scored, everything. It correlates well with points and goals scored and conceded though not every time - as is the case with Sunderland. That's also the point of using analysis like this though - if it lined up perfectly with the goals tallies of each team, what would be the point of it? The point of it is to raise questions about whether a team is getting "lucky or unlucky" in simplistic terms and do more research. Sometimes, there'll be good reasons as to why a team looks like an outlier. Other times, it really is the case that they may have just been getting lucky or unlucky over a run of fixtures.

3) Does Sunderland being 11th for Expected Goal Difference mean Sunderland aren't good?

No it doesn't, but is does suggest they aren't as good as other teams in the league at creating good chances regularly, and also aren't as good as other teams in the league at preventing chances. However, there are many reasons why it doesn't have to mean that Sunderland aren't good. One is that every model is flawed and a lot of you are completely right to point out that it matters which players the chances fall to and that Sunderland as a team might have better finishers than the rest of the league. Two is that there is other context sometimes missing that is only clear once digging even deeper. Someone mentioned that you've had played with 10 men quite often this season. Valid point. Another is that you've also not been playing with your strongest team for a lot of the season because of injuries. There are things like that that I haven't included because that's information I'd use after looking at the model to contextualise it. Hopefully you can all see that whilst Sunderland stick out, most of the other teams in the league are benchmarked fairly well.

For what it's worth, I've seen Sunderland 3 times this season (vs Luton, Shrewsbury, and Southend). In none of those games would I say Sunderland were obviously the better side in terms of chances created. I'd say that the games were all pretty balanced overall but then you've just scored your chances whilst other teams have missed theirs. Call it clinical finishing, call it killer instinct, call it whatever you want. The point is to imagine what if you had missed those chances, or what if your opponents had converted theirs. You may disagree with me on that if you want.

4) Should a model like this feature player ability?
Yeah, ideally it would. It's very hard to incorporate this for a number of reasons though. I can't just say Josh Maja is a good finisher because he's only taken 20 shots in League One this season. It would take a helluva lot more shots to statistically prove that he was an above average finisher. For the record, he's scored 9 goals from 20 shots this season which is really good, but also a better conversion rate than Messi over Messi's entire career. If you want to argue with me than Maja is a better finisher than Messi then fair play but I'd respectfully disagree. To be clear, I'm absolutely not saying that finishing skill does not exist - obviously some players are better finishers than others. It's just than in Expected Goals, that's something you'd take into account when forming your analysis. I don't think Sunderland are *that* much better finishers than the rest of the league though, because there are plenty of other good players and good goalkeepers in the league that don't play for Sunderland.

By the way, if you want an idea of the work that has to go into quantifying finishing skill, then please google search "Statsbomb quantifying finishing skill" and read the first article. Though if you hated my piece, you'll probably spontaneously combust when reading that.


5) Why does everyone love Barnsley?
I noticed a few people suggest that I said Barnsley were the best team in the league in the article, which I didn't at any point - I literally said they're on a downward trend. But, for what it's worth, from the eye test Barnsley *are* the best side I've seen play against Luton (I'm a Luton fan) this season. I've also watched them in several other games (as I have a job that requires me to watch a lot of League One) and they've also absolutely dominated teams in those games to a degree that I haven't seen from another League One side this season. It's just my opinion, you're allowed to feel differently. From the numbers used in my piece, they profiled as the best side in the league up until a couple of weeks ago. Using other measurements, as someone posted just now you might notice that Barnsley are now virtually level with Sunderland in the bookmakers eyes, despite Sunderland being heavily favoured over them prior to the season. That's despite Sunderland being above Barnsley in the table. Either Barnsley are performing better than the bookmakers thought they would do prior to the season kick off, or Sunderland are performing worse. In my opinion, it's both, again you're entitled to your own thoughts on that.

Anyway, as I said I know not everyone enjoys deeper analysis of football and do not like what I had to say in the article. Some of you probably don't like what I've had to say in this post either. That's fair enough, everyone's entitled to watch and think about football in whatever way they please. For me personally, my profession requires me to look at the things mentioned in the article and think about fooball in a similar way to what was written. One last point I'd like to reiterate is that I do not think that was was in the article is 100% fact and nothing else matters. It's missing some context, but I wasn't about to give 1000 words on every team and why they may look good or not so good by these measures and hopefully you'll forgive me for that and appreciate that you're the only club who I've gone to greater lengths for to offer an explanation! Fans of other clubs, such as Peterborough who I cast in a similar light, have actually told me that what I've said matches with what they've seen with their own eyes. It's interesting that the vast majority of you don't feel that way about Sunderland.

Good luck for the rest of the season. Everyone knows you shouldn't be in this division and aren't likely to be in it for long so please don't let an article written by a "nerd" ruin any of the enjoyment you've had so far.
That, and your article, is a long way to say that Sunderland are really f***ing clinical. :cool:
 
Afternoon all,

I noticed my article had picked up a fair amount of clicks through your site so I thought I'd check it out. It seems I've struck a nerve. Thanks to the few of you who found it interesting, apologies to those of you who felt their time had been wasted and thought it was "a load of bollocks", and other adjectives.

If you would give me just a couple more minutes I'd like to try and clarify some things. Believe me I'm not going to try and convince you to come around to my way of thinking and I also, for the record, do not believe that I am 100% right but there's been some interesting points raised in this thread that weren't fully explained in the article so I thought maybe if I offered more explanation then it might make more sense. I'll try and be brief but address some of the points raised.

By the way, I completely appreciate this way of looking at football isn't for everyone so please feel free to ignore this and carry on throwing pelters my way.

1) What is Expected Goals?
So, everytime a player takes a shot, it has a probability of going in. That's not me being mathsy or nerdy, it's just truth. Everytime a player picks up the ball, cuts inside and shoots from the edge of the area, there's a probability of that shot becoming a goal. Everytime a player is played in behind the defence and is through one on one, that also has a probability of becoming a goal. More likely than the shot from the edge of the area, right? Every shot is unique, but shots that have similar factors about them (i.e the location the shot was taken from, the body part used to strike the ball, positioning of defenders between ball and goal, etc) can be grouped together and you can use the average conversion rates to predict the likelihood of future shots going in. Over large samples, you can then say "well this is how many goals we would expected team X to score based on the shots they've taken" and vice versa for conceded. It's not perfect and it's not definite. When I say that Chris Maguire's goal against Southend had about a 3% chance of going in, that's because in simple terms shots from that distance have gone in 3 times out of 100 historically. That's not to say it was *exactly* 3%, it's just the most likely estimation we have based on the information we have.

Expected Goals is mostly used in gambling by bettors and bookmakers to benchmark teams ability but is also used within club boardrooms and in recruitment and analysis departments to analyse other teams and players.

2) Why is it important?
If you're still with me reading this then I'm glad you're keeping an open mind to this. I'm sure most of you would agree that creating more chances and better chances than your opponents on a regular basis is an important factor in generating good runs of results. Studies show that it is (currently) the best method of predicting future performance in smaller samples - better than number of shots taken, possession, goals scored, everything. It correlates well with points and goals scored and conceded though not every time - as is the case with Sunderland. That's also the point of using analysis like this though - if it lined up perfectly with the goals tallies of each team, what would be the point of it? The point of it is to raise questions about whether a team is getting "lucky or unlucky" in simplistic terms and do more research. Sometimes, there'll be good reasons as to why a team looks like an outlier. Other times, it really is the case that they may have just been getting lucky or unlucky over a run of fixtures.

3) Does Sunderland being 11th for Expected Goal Difference mean Sunderland aren't good?

No it doesn't, but is does suggest they aren't as good as other teams in the league at creating good chances regularly, and also aren't as good as other teams in the league at preventing chances. However, there are many reasons why it doesn't have to mean that Sunderland aren't good. One is that every model is flawed and a lot of you are completely right to point out that it matters which players the chances fall to and that Sunderland as a team might have better finishers than the rest of the league. Two is that there is other context sometimes missing that is only clear once digging even deeper. Someone mentioned that you've had played with 10 men quite often this season. Valid point. Another is that you've also not been playing with your strongest team for a lot of the season because of injuries. There are things like that that I haven't included because that's information I'd use after looking at the model to contextualise it. Hopefully you can all see that whilst Sunderland stick out, most of the other teams in the league are benchmarked fairly well.

For what it's worth, I've seen Sunderland 3 times this season (vs Luton, Shrewsbury, and Southend). In none of those games would I say Sunderland were obviously the better side in terms of chances created. I'd say that the games were all pretty balanced overall but then you've just scored your chances whilst other teams have missed theirs. Call it clinical finishing, call it killer instinct, call it whatever you want. The point is to imagine what if you had missed those chances, or what if your opponents had converted theirs. You may disagree with me on that if you want.

4) Should a model like this feature player ability?
Yeah, ideally it would. It's very hard to incorporate this for a number of reasons though. I can't just say Josh Maja is a good finisher because he's only taken 20 shots in League One this season. It would take a helluva lot more shots to statistically prove that he was an above average finisher. For the record, he's scored 9 goals from 20 shots this season which is really good, but also a better conversion rate than Messi over Messi's entire career. If you want to argue with me than Maja is a better finisher than Messi then fair play but I'd respectfully disagree. To be clear, I'm absolutely not saying that finishing skill does not exist - obviously some players are better finishers than others. It's just than in Expected Goals, that's something you'd take into account when forming your analysis. I don't think Sunderland are *that* much better finishers than the rest of the league though, because there are plenty of other good players and good goalkeepers in the league that don't play for Sunderland.

By the way, if you want an idea of the work that has to go into quantifying finishing skill, then please google search "Statsbomb quantifying finishing skill" and read the first article. Though if you hated my piece, you'll probably spontaneously combust when reading that.


5) Why does everyone love Barnsley?
I noticed a few people suggest that I said Barnsley were the best team in the league in the article, which I didn't at any point - I literally said they're on a downward trend. But, for what it's worth, from the eye test Barnsley *are* the best side I've seen play against Luton (I'm a Luton fan) this season. I've also watched them in several other games (as I have a job that requires me to watch a lot of League One) and they've also absolutely dominated teams in those games to a degree that I haven't seen from another League One side this season. It's just my opinion, you're allowed to feel differently. From the numbers used in my piece, they profiled as the best side in the league up until a couple of weeks ago. Using other measurements, as someone posted just now you might notice that Barnsley are now virtually level with Sunderland in the bookmakers eyes, despite Sunderland being heavily favoured over them prior to the season. That's despite Sunderland being above Barnsley in the table. Either Barnsley are performing better than the bookmakers thought they would do prior to the season kick off, or Sunderland are performing worse. In my opinion, it's both, again you're entitled to your own thoughts on that.

Anyway, as I said I know not everyone enjoys deeper analysis of football and do not like what I had to say in the article. Some of you probably don't like what I've had to say in this post either. That's fair enough, everyone's entitled to watch and think about football in whatever way they please. For me personally, my profession requires me to look at the things mentioned in the article and think about fooball in a similar way to what was written. One last point I'd like to reiterate is that I do not think that was was in the article is 100% fact and nothing else matters. It's missing some context, but I wasn't about to give 1000 words on every team and why they may look good or not so good by these measures and hopefully you'll forgive me for that and appreciate that you're the only club who I've gone to greater lengths for to offer an explanation! Fans of other clubs, such as Peterborough who I cast in a similar light, have actually told me that what I've said matches with what they've seen with their own eyes. It's interesting that the vast majority of you don't feel that way about Sunderland.

Good luck for the rest of the season. Everyone knows you shouldn't be in this division and aren't likely to be in it for long so please don't let an article written by a "nerd" ruin any of the enjoyment you've had so far.
Have you watched safc more than once?
 
Afternoon all,

I noticed my article had picked up a fair amount of clicks through your site so I thought I'd check it out. It seems I've struck a nerve. Thanks to the few of you who found it interesting, apologies to those of you who felt their time had been wasted and thought it was "a load of bollocks", and other adjectives.

If you would give me just a couple more minutes I'd like to try and clarify some things. Believe me I'm not going to try and convince you to come around to my way of thinking and I also, for the record, do not believe that I am 100% right but there's been some interesting points raised in this thread that weren't fully explained in the article so I thought maybe if I offered more explanation then it might make more sense. I'll try and be brief but address some of the points raised.

By the way, I completely appreciate this way of looking at football isn't for everyone so please feel free to ignore this and carry on throwing pelters my way.

1) What is Expected Goals?
So, everytime a player takes a shot, it has a probability of going in. That's not me being mathsy or nerdy, it's just truth. Everytime a player picks up the ball, cuts inside and shoots from the edge of the area, there's a probability of that shot becoming a goal. Everytime a player is played in behind the defence and is through one on one, that also has a probability of becoming a goal. More likely than the shot from the edge of the area, right? Every shot is unique, but shots that have similar factors about them (i.e the location the shot was taken from, the body part used to strike the ball, positioning of defenders between ball and goal, etc) can be grouped together and you can use the average conversion rates to predict the likelihood of future shots going in. Over large samples, you can then say "well this is how many goals we would expected team X to score based on the shots they've taken" and vice versa for conceded. It's not perfect and it's not definite. When I say that Chris Maguire's goal against Southend had about a 3% chance of going in, that's because in simple terms shots from that distance have gone in 3 times out of 100 historically. That's not to say it was *exactly* 3%, it's just the most likely estimation we have based on the information we have.

Expected Goals is mostly used in gambling by bettors and bookmakers to benchmark teams ability but is also used within club boardrooms and in recruitment and analysis departments to analyse other teams and players.

2) Why is it important?
If you're still with me reading this then I'm glad you're keeping an open mind to this. I'm sure most of you would agree that creating more chances and better chances than your opponents on a regular basis is an important factor in generating good runs of results. Studies show that it is (currently) the best method of predicting future performance in smaller samples - better than number of shots taken, possession, goals scored, everything. It correlates well with points and goals scored and conceded though not every time - as is the case with Sunderland. That's also the point of using analysis like this though - if it lined up perfectly with the goals tallies of each team, what would be the point of it? The point of it is to raise questions about whether a team is getting "lucky or unlucky" in simplistic terms and do more research. Sometimes, there'll be good reasons as to why a team looks like an outlier. Other times, it really is the case that they may have just been getting lucky or unlucky over a run of fixtures.

3) Does Sunderland being 11th for Expected Goal Difference mean Sunderland aren't good?

No it doesn't, but is does suggest they aren't as good as other teams in the league at creating good chances regularly, and also aren't as good as other teams in the league at preventing chances. However, there are many reasons why it doesn't have to mean that Sunderland aren't good. One is that every model is flawed and a lot of you are completely right to point out that it matters which players the chances fall to and that Sunderland as a team might have better finishers than the rest of the league. Two is that there is other context sometimes missing that is only clear once digging even deeper. Someone mentioned that you've had played with 10 men quite often this season. Valid point. Another is that you've also not been playing with your strongest team for a lot of the season because of injuries. There are things like that that I haven't included because that's information I'd use after looking at the model to contextualise it. Hopefully you can all see that whilst Sunderland stick out, most of the other teams in the league are benchmarked fairly well.

For what it's worth, I've seen Sunderland 3 times this season (vs Luton, Shrewsbury, and Southend). In none of those games would I say Sunderland were obviously the better side in terms of chances created. I'd say that the games were all pretty balanced overall but then you've just scored your chances whilst other teams have missed theirs. Call it clinical finishing, call it killer instinct, call it whatever you want. The point is to imagine what if you had missed those chances, or what if your opponents had converted theirs. You may disagree with me on that if you want.

4) Should a model like this feature player ability?
Yeah, ideally it would. It's very hard to incorporate this for a number of reasons though. I can't just say Josh Maja is a good finisher because he's only taken 20 shots in League One this season. It would take a helluva lot more shots to statistically prove that he was an above average finisher. For the record, he's scored 9 goals from 20 shots this season which is really good, but also a better conversion rate than Messi over Messi's entire career. If you want to argue with me than Maja is a better finisher than Messi then fair play but I'd respectfully disagree. To be clear, I'm absolutely not saying that finishing skill does not exist - obviously some players are better finishers than others. It's just than in Expected Goals, that's something you'd take into account when forming your analysis. I don't think Sunderland are *that* much better finishers than the rest of the league though, because there are plenty of other good players and good goalkeepers in the league that don't play for Sunderland.

By the way, if you want an idea of the work that has to go into quantifying finishing skill, then please google search "Statsbomb quantifying finishing skill" and read the first article. Though if you hated my piece, you'll probably spontaneously combust when reading that.


5) Why does everyone love Barnsley?
I noticed a few people suggest that I said Barnsley were the best team in the league in the article, which I didn't at any point - I literally said they're on a downward trend. But, for what it's worth, from the eye test Barnsley *are* the best side I've seen play against Luton (I'm a Luton fan) this season. I've also watched them in several other games (as I have a job that requires me to watch a lot of League One) and they've also absolutely dominated teams in those games to a degree that I haven't seen from another League One side this season. It's just my opinion, you're allowed to feel differently. From the numbers used in my piece, they profiled as the best side in the league up until a couple of weeks ago. Using other measurements, as someone posted just now you might notice that Barnsley are now virtually level with Sunderland in the bookmakers eyes, despite Sunderland being heavily favoured over them prior to the season. That's despite Sunderland being above Barnsley in the table. Either Barnsley are performing better than the bookmakers thought they would do prior to the season kick off, or Sunderland are performing worse. In my opinion, it's both, again you're entitled to your own thoughts on that.

Anyway, as I said I know not everyone enjoys deeper analysis of football and do not like what I had to say in the article. Some of you probably don't like what I've had to say in this post either. That's fair enough, everyone's entitled to watch and think about football in whatever way they please. For me personally, my profession requires me to look at the things mentioned in the article and think about fooball in a similar way to what was written. One last point I'd like to reiterate is that I do not think that was was in the article is 100% fact and nothing else matters. It's missing some context, but I wasn't about to give 1000 words on every team and why they may look good or not so good by these measures and hopefully you'll forgive me for that and appreciate that you're the only club who I've gone to greater lengths for to offer an explanation! Fans of other clubs, such as Peterborough who I cast in a similar light, have actually told me that what I've said matches with what they've seen with their own eyes. It's interesting that the vast majority of you don't feel that way about Sunderland.

Good luck for the rest of the season. Everyone knows you shouldn't be in this division and aren't likely to be in it for long so please don't let an article written by a "nerd" ruin any of the enjoyment you've had so far.


:lol: fuck off man
 
:lol: fuck off man
He states he bases it on watching Luton and Barnsley a few times.

Apparently he concludes Barnsley are doing better and safc worse.

That makes no sense in terms of the actual reality of how safc have played this season.
 
He states he bases it on watching Luton and Barnsley a few times.

Apparently he concludes Barnsley are doing better and safc worse.

That makes no sense in terms of the actual reality of how safc have played this season.

Most other clubs play SAFC and set out a stall to get everyone behind the ball, defend for their lives, little ambition to attack etc. Almost every team this season has done that other than Charlton on the opening day. Even the sides chasing promotion.

They don’t do this against every team.

Therefore comparing the chances created/expected goals number is bollocks

If teams set out when playing us like they do when they play (say) Plymouth or Wimbledon, we’d be making loads of chances every game and pasting sides 6/7/8-0

Answer that @wherethesmokegoes1
 
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Most other clubs play SAFC and set out a stall to get everyone behind the ball, defend for their lives, little ambition to attack etc

They don’t do this against every team.

Therefore comparing the chances created/expected goals number is bollocks

If teams set out playing us like they do when they play (say) Plymouth or Wimbledon, we’d be making loads of chances every game and pasting sides 6/7/8-0

Answer that @wherethesmokegoes1
Exactly. The table is the only statistical analysis required and he admits to be a Luton fan and basing his facts on seeing Barnsley.

This expected goal rubbish is exactly that.
 
Most other clubs play SAFC and set out a stall to get everyone behind the ball, defend for their lives, little ambition to attack etc. Almost every team this season has done that other than Charlton on the opening day. Even the sides chasing promotion.

They don’t do this against every team.

Therefore comparing the chances created/expected goals number is bollocks

If teams set out when playing us like they do when they play (say) Plymouth or Wimbledon, we’d be making loads of chances every game and pasting sides 6/7/8-0

Answer that @wherethesmokegoes1

We’ve come up against the same this season, but like yourselves we’ve still managed to break teams down in the most part, Sarfend were time wasting from the 4th minute until the 87th. It’s the nature of the beast we need to get used to it just the wins keep coming.
 
We’ve come up against the same this season, but like yourselves we’ve still managed to break teams down in the most part, Sarfend were time wasting from the 4th minute until the 87th. It’s the nature of the beast we need to get used to it just the wins keep coming.

Not as often as us though - that’s why we’re above yous :)
 
Love this quote:
‘35 points from 16 games equates to 100 points over a full season – ergo if Pompey keep their form up then they’re very likely to win the league title’

If the top team keep gaining the most points they win the league. Proper big brain analysis.
 
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In defence of the author of this, I do get his point that, for most teams, especially typical / average teams, this may be a good measure. It does not, and cannot, factor in the variables like 'we appear to be better at converting chances' (ability of players) and preventing goals (McLaughlin is playing in a division way below his ability), nor the players getting sent off or a thousand other small variables. For a typical side, xg isn't an entirely inappropriate measure, but, for us, at the moment, we're the extreme outlier, exceptionally atypical, but, I contend it's not an anomaly and not 'dumb luck' but down to our having better players in key positions.

Re. the comparison to Messi, I'm hoping that the author is using this tongue in cheek, as, Maja is playing in league 1, whereas Messi is playing at the highest possible level. Messi in League 1 would have absurd stats and / or multiple fractures.
 
In defence of the author of this, I do get his point that, for most teams, especially typical / average teams, this may be a good measure. It does not, and cannot, factor in the variables like 'we appear to be better at converting chances' (ability of players) and preventing goals (McLaughlin is playing in a division way below his ability), nor the players getting sent off or a thousand other small variables. For a typical side, xg isn't an entirely inappropriate measure, but, for us, at the moment, we're the extreme outlier, exceptionally atypical, but, I contend it's not an anomaly and not 'dumb luck' but down to our having better players in key positions.

Re. the comparison to Messi, I'm hoping that the author is using this tongue in cheek, as, Maja is playing in league 1, whereas Messi is playing at the highest possible level. Messi in League 1 would have absurd stats.
Luton fan and he’s watched Barnsley. I’ve asked how many times he has watched safc. If it’s more than the 1-1 down Luton, I’ll be shocked
 
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