Celtic’s scoring prowess reduced this season. Celtic scored 126 goals over 61 matches (2.07 per game) compared to 150 over 59 last season (2.54 per game). Edouard scored 11 from 14 starts. Impressive? Yes! But that’s a lazy stat and here’s why. The Glossary buries lack of clarity from any distance into the bottom corner, … [continue reading]
Goals
Some Goals Are Bigger Than Others
Not all goals are equal. A last minute winner is clearly more valuable than the 4th goal in the 85th minute of a 4-0 win in terms of securing victory. And we can measure that using Expected Points (xPTS). xPTS is a value assigned to each goal a player scores on the basis that every … [continue reading]
Long Range Lament
Celtic have scored 13 goals in their last 10 league games despite averaging 2 per league game overall and scoring more than 100 in the league last season. Only 6 have been scored in 5 since the New Year break. Creative Deficit and League Performance Regression? Yes. Here’s Why explained how injury to the most … [continue reading]
Great Start Scott
Who scores the goals? The traditional pundit often attests the only numbers that matter are in the top left-hand corner of your screen – the game score. Goals are rare in football, around 3 per match, and goal scorers priceless. But those interested in performance know that to score a goal takes a team, and … [continue reading]
Striker Light
Griffiths has trained today and is on the ‘plane for Rosenborg away in the crucial Champions League Qualifier, second leg, in Trondheim. He played no part in the 5-0 Dafabet Cup match away to Sunderland at the weekend. Is he 100% fit, or a lesser percentage? Can he start? Or be used as an impact … [continue reading]
We Need To Talk About Leigh
The received wisdom for many years is that teams need four good strikers to choose from. Celtic have had two. This apparent folly was called out by fate when both Dembele and Griffiths were injured at the same time in January. An invincible treble suggests the squad coped – will it again? In the final … [continue reading]
Shooting Stars
Top U21 Scorers I revisited the comparison of Celtic wide attackers in Give Me More Wings. This analysis was refreshed thanks to Tiago Estêvão? (please follow him on Twitter @TiagoEstv). Tiago has now come up with an analysis of the top 3 Under 21 goal scorers in each of the top 6 European Leagues (plus … [continue reading]
Give Me More Wings
Last night on Twitter, Tiago Estêvão@TiagoEstv posted a fascinating analysis of performance data for the 4 most productive wingers (goals and assists) from the 6 leading leagues in Europe (England, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal and Spain – he is Portugese!). Wingers With End Product I reproduce the output here – again with thanks to Tiago … [continue reading]
The 100 Club
Please read @footballcommune latest http://www.footballcommune.com/celtics-centurions/. This is shaping up to be as goal laden a season as some of the O’Neill years where 5 and 6 goal hammerings were common and 148 goals were racked up in 2000/01. You may be surprised how many Deila’s teams managed but please read George’s article for the detail. … [continue reading]