Liverpool FC Forum

by tubby » Fri Nov 11, 2005 10:44 am

by drummerphil » Fri Nov 11, 2005 10:55 am

my reason for living

   






Bob Paisley : "Still we've had the hard times too - one year we finished second."

...

by Garymac » Fri Nov 11, 2005 1:39 pm

by TheoRacle » Thu Nov 17, 2005 2:32 am

Part Two – and you thought my first post was OTT!

Babu said:

” The stats you present are as of now right? I.e. just before mid season. A way to see if this kind of statistical analysing is worth a pinch of salt is to look at past seasons.”

Well, I plugged in last season’s stats courtesy again of ESPN‘s Soccernet and had a look at how the top seven teams rated using the same stat groupings.

My original post in this thread explained that the idea of looking at the stats in the first place was to see if I could measure our performance against other teams in the league and somehow compare how we are tracking against the league leaders.

I used the following categories to rank the teams and on which to base my comments:

Shots per game
Time in possession,
Shots per minute of possession
Goals conceded,
Saves made,
Percentage of shots on target
and the percentage of goals converted from both shots on goal and total shots.

However, after collating the stats for the 2004-2005 season, it seems there is a relationship between final league position and the following categories:

Shots per game
Shots on target
# of corners won
Time in possession
Red cards
Saves made
Goals scored per game
Goal difference
Percentage of shots on target
Percentage of goals converted from total shots
Possession split
Shots per minute played
Shots per minute of possession held

When I say relationship, I mean that the top seven teams dominate these categories with Chelsea ranking 1st, 2nd or 3rd in every category, Arsenal ranking 1st , 2nd, 3rd or 4th in 9 out of the 13 categories and Man Utd who finished 3rd in the league ranked 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th in six of the 13 categories.

The only teams of note outside the top seven who ranked in the top 3 of these categories are Newcastle with equal 2nd position for # of corners won plus 3rd for goal difference, Man City who topped the list for the lowest # of saves made at an average of 3.16 per game and Tottenham with their fair play effort of zero red cards awarded.

So for those who haven’t already jumped to another thread… the top four rankings (plus us where req’d) for each category are:

Category              RankTeam      League position Score
Shots per game:   1st  Chelsea           1st                 14.03 per game
                          2nd  Man Utd          3rd                 13.92
                          3rd  Middlesborough 7th                 13.82
                          4th  Bolton             6th                 12.71
                          =8th Liverpool         5th                 11.08

Shots on target:  1st   Chelsea           1st                   8.00 per game
                          2nd  Arsenal             2nd                 7.87
3rd   Middlesborough  7th                  7.71
                          4th  Man Utd            3rd                 7.53
                          9th  Liverpool           5th                 5.68

# of corners:        1st  Man Utd            3rd                  7.23 per game
                        =2nd Chelsea             1st                  6.21
                        =2nd Newcastle         14th                 6.21
                        4th Liverpool             5th                  5.82


% possession:      1st  Arsenal             2nd                 57.1%
                         2nd Chelsea             1st                 53.6%
                        =3rd Liverpool           5th                 51.4%
                        =3rd Newcastle        14th                51.4%

Red cards:          =1st Tottenham        9th                 0 cards per game
                        =1st Chelsea             1st                 0
                        =3rd Arsenal             2nd                 0.03
                        =3rd Everton            4th                  0.03
                        19th Liverpool           5th                 0.16

Saves made:       1st  Man City            8th                 3.16 saves per game
                        2nd Arsenal              2nd                 3.63
                        3rd Chelsea              1st                 4.21
                       =4th Liverpool           5th                 4.24
                       =4th Bolton               6th                4.24

Goals per game:   1st Arsenal              2nd                 2.29 goals per game
                        2nd  Chelsea             1st                  1.84
                        3rd  Bolton               5th                 1.55
                        4th  Middlesborough   7th                 1.47
                        5th  Liverpool            4th                 1.42

Goal difference:   1st  Chelsea              1st                  +52
                        2nd  Arsenal              2nd                  +51
                        3rd  Newcastle          14th                 +24
                        4th  Middlesborough    7th                  +22
                        8th  Liverpool             5th                  +5

Shots on target:  1st  Everton              4th                 67%
                        2nd  Arsenal              2nd                 62%
                        3rd  Chelsea              1st                 57%
                        4th  Middlesborough    7th                 56%
                      =13th Liverpool            5th                 51%

Percentage of goals scored from total shots:
                        1st  Arsenal               2nd                18.2%
                        2nd  Fulham               13th              14.3%
                        3rd  Everton              4th                13.3%
                        4th  Charlton              11th             13.2%
                        6th  Liverpool             5th               12.8%

Possession split:  1st  Arsenal               2nd               57.1% : 42.9%
                        2nd Chelsea               1st                53.6% : 46.4%
                       =3rd Liverpool              5th              51.4% : 48.6%
                       =3rd Newcastle           14th              51.4% : 48.6%

Shots per minute played:
                        1st Chelsea                1st   0.156 shots per minute
                        2nd Man Utd               3rd   0.155
                        3rd  Middlesborough     7th   0.154
                        4th  Bolton                 6th   0.141
                       =8th Liverpool              5th   0.123

Shots per minute of possession held
                         1st Man Utd               3rd   0.31 shots per min in possession
                         2nd Middlesborough     7th   0.30
                         3rd Chelsea                1st   0.29
                         4th Bolton                  6th  0.28
                         =9th Liverpool              5th 0.24


Interpretation:

So how do these categories affect the outcome of the game: and this is where the debate should start….

Shots per game: Obvious really – you don’t score unless you kick the ball towards their net. Chelsea peppered their opponents goals with shots, 1 every 6 minutes compared with Charlton’s 1 shot every 10-11mins.

Shots on target: Again obviously accuracy and meaningful attempts on goal is what we want, not 40 yard blazes that end up in row X. I hate to say it but again Chelsea showed how this should be done with 8 of their 14 shots on target each game.

# of corners won: I’ve assumed that the # of corners won reflects the level of attacking pressure applied by the team. On an individual game basis this may be misleading however over the season as a whole I think this is as good a way as any to show how often scoring opportunities arise.

Time in possession: Notwithstanding that some teams have a natural counter attacking style, time in possession indicates how well a team control’s play and to a certain extent limits the attacking opportunities of their opponents.

Red cards: I wasn’t expecting to see this category involved tbh but I guess if you’ve only got ten men on the pitch your share of possession and therefore attacking opportunities is reduced.  Although there was not a great statistical deviation with Man City collecting the most cards at 7 (Liverpool had 6!!!), Spurs and Chelsea at the other end of the scale played all 38 games with eleven men for the full 90 minutes while Arsenal and Everton only had the 1 red card each all season.

Saves made: Another somewhat controversial stat I believe.  This either shows that you’ve got a great defence who protected the keeper and minimised his workload, a keeper who can’t get near the ball or a shitty defence who let plenty of shots through and fantastic keeper who saves everything. However when taken in context by examining the goals conceded stats, those teams with a low number of saves also recorded a low number of goals conceded indicating that perhaps this stat does indeed reflect the all round ability of a team’s defence.

Goals scored per game: Simplistically, to win the game you have to score more goals than your opponent. Naturally, the more goals you score in a game the more your opponent has to score to get a draw let alone win. On face value this should mean that Arsenal with their 2.29 goals per game should have won the league but of course your defence plays a key role as well.  Hang on though, didn’t Arsenal record a lower number of saves than Chelsea and by my argument above this should mean that their defence is better than Chelsea’s. Well perhaps it is… maybe this anomaly can be explained by the words ‘Petr Cech’. See Goal Difference below.

Goal difference:  Yes Arsenal’s tally of 87 goals for the season is impressive as is there goal difference of +51. But as alluded to above even though Arsenal edged Chelsea on goals per game, possession and saves made, Chelsea still scraped into top spot on Goal Difference by 1.  Conclusion, unfortunately Petr Cech is good.

Percentage of shots on target: This is simply the ration of shots on target vs total shots expressed as a percentage. The higher your percentage the less wild shots into the stands and the higher the chances of actually scoring. Neverton make their one and only appearance as #1 here with 67% of their relatively low 9.47 shots per game (=15th) being on target. Incidentally, this is the area where we are underachieving this season. RAFA THIS NEEDS ATTENTION.

Percentage of goals converted from total shots: The old adage about making every chance count it reflected by this stat. Chelsea and Arsenal converted 18.2% and 14.3% of their chances respectively with Everton coming third on 13.3%.  Interestingly this season Everton are coming last on chances converted with only 3.6% but sadly we are not much better on 6.3%.

Possession split: Simply a different way of representing the time in possession stat above. No further comment required.

Shots per minute played: A representation of a teams ability to pressurise opponents and quantify the creativity of the teams playing style. 

Shots per minute of possession held: Takes the above to the next level, did the teams 60% possession involve sitting on the ball in their own half or doing something useful with it?

Conclusion

Although these figures do not and cannot quantify dodgy refereeing decisions, off sides that weren’t, goals that weren’t or those incidents which changed a game that were pure luck, I think that they do show a general trend and how the top teams finished where they did.

Turning again to this season, the mightY LFC are placed well to finish in the top three but ONLY IF we manage to get our strikers hitting the target more often. We converted 12.8% of our shots into goals last season, more than held our own with 51.4% of possession and defended well but fell short on total shots made coming in 9th.  This season to date we have increased our level of possession to 55.1%, are defence is even more solid with a saves made rate of 3.20 which is approaching Man City’s 3.16 of last season and have increased our shots per game to be ranked 2nd.  We just need our conversion rate to go up: it stands now on a disappointing 6.3%. An extra goal in each of our home games would have pushed that up to 11.9%.  The challenge is their for Rafa and our strikers.  We are playing well, creating chances and threatening the opposition.  I’ve said it before, one or two goals of Morientes’ ; Crouch’s shoulder or Cisse’s knee and some confidence will seep into our forward line.  Then there’ll be no stopping us.

by A.B. » Thu Nov 17, 2005 2:46 am

You have WAYYYYYYYY too much time on you hands

by Liverpool 4 EVA » Thu Nov 17, 2005 4:03 am

TheoRacle

Excellent post again mate, appreciate the time you took to write it.

Cheers. 

by 115-1073096938 » Thu Nov 17, 2005 4:07 am

You still haven't had ya nutz then?

Good read mate, i'm not a firm believer in these stats, i believe you make your own luck in football. HOWEVER, its very thought provoking and a superb read.

by TheoRacle » Fri Nov 18, 2005 1:35 am

by andy_g » Fri Nov 18, 2005 1:45 am

Get up! everybody's gonna move their feet
Get Down! everybody's gonna leave their seat