It requires some interpretation but it can absolutely be used to tell you things about a game in isolation. Caley Graphics shows how easy it is to contextualise penalties in xG.
United and xG (now that Ole is gone will things change?)
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
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In the latest edition of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) and Ed (@That'sHernandez) do their best to not talk about the Brighton game, and so instead cover United's youngsters, giving opinions on who they think might make it into the first team over the next few seasons. They also touch on the Rangnick era, transfer speculation, and training ground punch-ups.
You have a non-pen xG stat right above you...
Still doesn't tell you enough from a single game. Unless one side blew the other side out of the park, xG numbers for a single game can't be used.
You're having Non Shot xG - which some companies like 538 use in addition to others, there's the match state, the injuries, red cards, etc. bit and all the other variables that can happen
That's why I said it does require some human interpretation and contextualisation. I think most people are able to understand that there are variables that can affect the xG.
It tells you roughly the quality of the chances from that game. That is what xG is for. It never tells the flow of a game a lot.
The chances that ended in a shot. If anything #big chances in the game is a better indicator of that over a smaller data size.
Eg. The Soyuncu chance would be maybe a .85 xG shot, the Rashford one a 0.3 or something. If there is a game that has just those 2 shots, one can't really say that 1 of the 2 teams deserved to win it.
The case is similar to Utd Southampton game earlier this season. xG wise it ended something like 2.2-0.8 for us. But a lot of us feel that we were lucky to get a point (that's a bit of an overreaction, but as per xG you'd say we should have comfortably won the game)
Attacking output in the usual range, defence horrific again.
Expected it to be higher for Liverpool to be honest.
3.6 is high.
Not when they scored 5.
I notice that our total xG is now lower than our total xGA.
Shocking really but the defence has only really been disastrous in the game against Leicester and Liverpool. Perhaps counterintuitively at this point, the big problem is that we just don't create enough big chances.
So after 9 gameweeks xGD starting to show exactly where different teams are at in terms of performances thus far. It ain't pretty.
9 game weeks where you could make a reasonable argument that we’ve had the easiest fixtures of any team in the league. Only two games against “top four contenders”. Leicester theoretically tricky but in terrible form (until they played us) and Liverpool at home after a very tough midweek away fixture for them.So after 9 gameweeks xGD starting to show exactly where different teams are at in terms of performances thus far. It ain't pretty.
Pool and City are in another league. Klopp is amazing. Spent almost nada too this summer.
Big hammerings pretty much always involve a team overperforming their xG. Which is one reason to caveat its use when looking at single games.
In the famous Germany versus Brazil game for example the xG was around 1.6 - 3.1 and our 6-1 loss to Spurs something like 0.87 - 3.12. So that puts yesterday's 1.2 - 3.6 into context.
Our defence was only disastrous in our last two league games but it’s been far from good beforehand. Hence the lack of clean sheets and De Gea being our best player so far this season. Despite playing against some of the weaker teams in the league.
We’ve problems in attack and defence.
Midfield isn’t great either!
I remember not too terribly long ago we had a discussion about potential available managers and what these numbers might look like right about now. At the time I stated that Ole is a known quantity and a safe hand for top four at the very least. But the performances have deteriorated of late to the point I am concerned about his ability to even secure CL for next season. And the numbers bare that out now as well. Worrying stuff.So after 9 gameweeks xGD starting to show exactly where different teams are at in terms of performances thus far. It ain't pretty.
We're trying to play more progressively whilst not actually getting any better at attacking and leaving the defence more exposed. It's quite the trick from Ole. We should've just sat in and countered yesterday.
Yup. And if Ole doesn’t rein it in we are in for a horror run of results looking at the fixture list.
Michael Cox has done a tactical breakdown of the game in The Athletic. His analysis is that in this new system the midfield are being constantly exposed by the poor positioning of the attacking players. He also points to a lack of method and cohesion in the pressing. Our players press in pointless situations and there's no joined up approach.
Ironically, our solitary clean sheet this season came from an absolutely shambolic defensive performance when Wolves carved us open at will for about 60 minutes. It's pretty much a miracle we didn't concede in that game.
The first goal yesterday jumps to mind. It looked like our players were pressing on three seconds delay and we ended up carving ourselves open as a result.
I thought that situation actually suggested a poorly coached approach. Greenwood started a high press and AWB followed him, Lindelof then covered AWB's position and Maguire Lindelof's position. This left Liverpool with an overload against Shaw from which they scored. It was comical stuff really.
All started with Bruno needlessly charging down Alison. Greenwood followed suit and then the dominos fell one by one. What we’re supposed to be doing off the ball upfront this season is anyone’s guess. I also don’t understand why we are incapable of holding a line at the back, never mind organizing an offside trap. Always seems to be one defender five yards deeper than everyone else.
Teams rarely racked up xG to match a high number of goals. The worrying thing is that Klopp called off the troops versus 10 men.
Which is putting us in a real dichotomy, as he is significantly handicapping us in playing out from the back, and in every other aspect bar shot stopping defensively. It becomes more and more obvious each and every game.
A high press is one of those things that needs really good coaching. It needs the entire team to know its time to press and push up, including the goalkeeper, otherwise you just end up horribly out of shape. Our first goal yesterday is a textbook example of what can go wrong if you don't press hard and coordinated, there's suddenly space all over the shop. Once they got past the initial press for Keita's goal, every pass was a simple one from the half way line to our net.
Yes, agreed. Been obvious for ages.
I don't think any other individual moment killed me more than seeing De Gea play his goal kick one yard left to Maguire, who then aimlessly hoofed it to their centre backs.
It's like Ole is trying to prove he can go toe to toe with the best managers around and play on the front foot against them. When in reality he simply can't. If he stays, and I pray he doesn't, he should just revert to what he - and pretty much every mediocre manager out there - is able to pull off: Sit back and hit the good teams on the counter.
Maybe we should get him as interim. Sounds like he’s noticing the obvious way better than Ole.
It’s brutal. Especially when you see much worse team, with much worse players, do it so much better. Crystal Palace vs Arsenal a recent example that sticks in my mind.
Whilst De Gea is a factor, for me the bigger factor is our midfield. They have no press resistance and no off the ball movement. They make playing out of the back an impossible task, especially when the full backs are already pushed forward.
On the subject, it's also funny that when Pogba is on the pitch, he's the default target man for goal kicks. Saw this again yesterday as soon as he came on. Laughable tactic.
I have to say that I saw this coming. I think people were taking too much out of last season's goal scoring total without taking into account we scored 9 goals in one game. Our goal scoring outside of that game was pretty poor.
Goals per game
1.92 goals per game (with the 9 goals win)
1.73 goals per game (without 9 goal win)
xG per game
1.68 xG per game (with the 9 goal win)
1.59 xG per game (without 9 goal win)
In comparison (xG from this season):
Man City: 2.38 per game
Liverpool: 2.73 per game
Chelsea: 1.83 per game
Manutd : 1.65 per game
So, we are actually operating at about the same level in terms of xG as last season. It is just being shown up for it actually being poor for a club of our size, and it was poor last season, also. Last season was never sustainable and was never a good marker of where we actually are under Solskjaer.
Goals per game
1.92 goals per game (with the 9 goals win)
1.73 goals per game (without 9 goal win)
xG per game
1.68 xG per game (with the 9 goal win)
1.59 xG per game (without 9 goal win)
In comparison (xG from this season):
Man City: 2.38 per game
Liverpool: 2.73 per game
Chelsea: 1.83 per game
Manutd : 1.65 per game
So, we are actually operating at about the same level in terms of xG as last season. It is just being shown up for it actually being poor for a club of our size, and it was poor last season, also. Last season was never sustainable and was never a good marker of where we actually are under Solskjaer.
Playing out from the back with a goalkeeper who cannot and does not want to be involved is nearly pointless. Opposition can go just go man-to-man. Playing out from the back is supposed to mean you are 11 vs 10, but with De Gea we don't have the numerical superiority.
Agreed. The two CBs plus the GK makes a simple triangle that eliminates the risk of any half arsed press from the opposition. If they send even two players to press your CBs, then you simply go to the keeper then on to the full backs, because you always outnumber them. Its still hard to pass with the opposition closing you down fast, but you have an option.
But if the GK doesn't want the ball then its a totally different story. Suddenly its entirely possible to cover every short pass the CB could make, leaving them with nothing but risky long balls down the pitch to make - or they end up hesitating looking for a pass and get caught.
And that we didn't score that many even accounting for the 9 in one game (15 in 2 if you want to include Leeds too). If we agree that the aim is to win the league, 73 goals a season doesn't cut it (if you want to say it shows an upward trend from the previous season, that's valid - except the underlying numbers barely moved between 19/20 and 20/21).
Pretty sure it was in this same thread a few weeks ago that people (including me) were trying to make the point that we haven't been great going forward for years and years now, and the usual "lolpatternsofplay" crowd were saying well, we were second highest scorers last season and we're doing well on xG this season (4 or 5 league games in), so we're clearly dominating games by "most metrics". That's aged well.
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Most teams actually drop down defensive midfielder and form three at the back in a manner called "Salida Lavolpiana" after Argentinian coach Ricardo La Volpe, who first introduced it. Full backs move higher up, defensive midfielder drops down and central defenders spread sideways, making it much more difficult for opposition to press you effectively.
I'm not saying this without reason. Defensive midfielder has to know thing or two in terms of passing and has to be press resistant. Imagine McTominay being employed in such task. Just considering it sounds horrible.
When we played under LVG supposedly all the players hated how they were suffocated with information in a rigid style and now they feel like Ole gives them too much freedom. The spine of these teams is weak and we have too many passenger players who won’t put in an intense shift. They are also very quick to shift the blame on from themselves