The 25/26 Stat Topic - “Statistically Terrible, Visually Even Worse”

[Sly]

I noticed we don’t have one, so I was doing some reading to scratch the surface on wha is actually happening with the tactics. 
 

So so figure this ….

 

Games played - 12

Goals - 15

xG for - 14.1

 

We are outperforming xG. That in itself is great, however we simply aren’t generating enough chances.

 

We are averaging an xG of 1.12 a game! 
 

In terms of actual players, our top five are

Fatawu - xG of 1.7, 3 goals this season.

Vestergaard - xG of 1.3, 2 goals this season.

Ricardo - xG of 1.3, 2 goals this season.

Ayew - xG of 1.3, 1 goal this season.

Daka - xG of 1.2, 0 goals this season.

 

Worrying …….. we are not generating enough chances.

 

Assists is another joke .. El Khannous is still 2nd after Fatawu. He couldn’t get out of here quick enough. Both are on two.

 

Some other interesting stuff on how are players are perceived statistically.

 

Vestergaard is our highest match rated player this season. 
 

Jordan Ayew is in the top 20% of centre forwards for touches, however also chances created! 
 

Ricardo is one of the best fullbacks in this league. Top for goals from fullbacks, great defensive contributions as well …. Weakness, aerial duels.

 

Overall match / player performance we rank 6th of all teams.  Cov are top.

 

Goals for per match - 6th.

Our xG per match for is 14th though! Again, we aren’t generating chances.

 

Goals against per match - 7th

Our xG per match against is 5th.

 

So we are currently conceding less and scoring more than we statistically could. Long term, unsustainable.

 

Average possession - 3rd. Interestingly th two teams higher than us are Southampton and Ipswich. Tells its own story. We are 2nd in terms of accurate passes. Basically we mess around a lot and go nowhere is what that says to me.

 

Long passes - 23rd. We aren’t direct in the slightest. 2 years ago we were 7th. Enzo / Marti, different tactics. 

Interceptions per match against- 23rd.

 

Statistically we are very average and it points at us finishing 6th / 7th currently. We’ll scrape playoffs doing what we currently are. Factor the impending points deduction and then you consider we will miss them.

 

Ae should compare with two seasons ago, however people will. I’m sure Top and Rudkin will also. We are still playing possession based football, however we are doing less with it. We need to be more aggressive with it. Playing further up the pitch takes pressure off the defence, that is one Faes brain fart away from conceding.

 

I’m sure our new tactical genius will know all of this though …..

[SafewayFox]

Great post mate.

 

I think it’s @kingfox that has numerous times posted about our pressing numbers too.

 

In short, we’re passive and have hideous unlikeable players playing for us.

[Sly]

Oh, our pressing and “trap setting” is also …. Woeful. 

[slymunn]

We didn't need all the XG stuff, anyone who's watched us can see the issues in nearly every match weve played this season.

 

Very few clear cut chances, and not that much effort off the ball. 

[Stadt]

Stolarcyzk is joint top for most post shot xG prevented too. We should be about 15th and it’s a couple of Fatawu screamers propping us up atm

[CornwallFox]

The moment anybody pushes post on something containing the letters "xG" they should be immediately banned. 

 

Admittedly I'd be in trouble for this post.

[Stadt]

1 minute ago, CornwallFox said:

The moment anybody pushes post on something containing the letters "xG" they should be immediately banned. 

 

Admittedly I'd be in trouble for this post.

Equally, you could choose to read the “25/26 Stat Topic” not click the link, not read the original post, not read the following posts and choose not to post your trite response either.

[CornwallFox]

4 minutes ago, Stadt said:

Equally, you could choose to read the “25/26 Stat Topic” not click the link, not read the original post, not read the following posts and choose not to post your trite response either.

True but then I couldn't fish for comments with a not-very-disguised bait could I? 

[niyaminski]

1 hour ago, Sly said:

Oh, our pressing and “trap setting” is also …. Woeful. 

Does it exist?

 

I haven’t seen any evidence that it does

[funkyrobot]

3 hours ago, Sly said:

I noticed we don’t have one, so I was doing some reading to scratch the surface on wha is actually happening with the tactics. 
 

So so figure this ….

 

Games played - 12

Goals - 15

xG for - 14.1

 

We are outperforming xG. That in itself is great, however we simply aren’t generating enough chances.

 

We are averaging an xG of 1.12 a game! 
 

In terms of actual players, our top five are

Fatawu - xG of 1.7, 3 goals this season.

Vestergaard - xG of 1.3, 2 goals this season.

Ricardo - xG of 1.3, 2 goals this season.

Ayew - xG of 1.3, 1 goal this season.

Daka - xG of 1.2, 0 goals this season.

 

Worrying …….. we are not generating enough chances.

 

Assists is another joke .. El Khannous is still 2nd after Fatawu. He couldn’t get out of here quick enough. Both are on two.

 

Some other interesting stuff on how are players are perceived statistically.

 

Vestergaard is our highest match rated player this season. 
 

Jordan Ayew is in the top 20% of centre forwards for touches, however also chances created! 
 

Ricardo is one of the best fullbacks in this league. Top for goals from fullbacks, great defensive contributions as well …. Weakness, aerial duels.

 

Overall match / player performance we rank 6th of all teams.  Cov are top.

 

Goals for per match - 6th.

Our xG per match for is 14th though! Again, we aren’t generating chances.

 

Goals against per match - 7th

Our xG per match against is 5th.

 

So we are currently conceding less and scoring more than we statistically could. Long term, unsustainable.

 

Average possession - 3rd. Interestingly th two teams higher than us are Southampton and Ipswich. Tells its own story. We are 2nd in terms of accurate passes. Basically we mess around a lot and go nowhere is what that says to me.

 

Long passes - 23rd. We aren’t direct in the slightest. 2 years ago we were 7th. Enzo / Marti, different tactics. 

Interceptions per match against- 23rd.

 

Statistically we are very average and it points at us finishing 6th / 7th currently. We’ll scrape playoffs doing what we currently are. Factor the impending points deduction and then you consider we will miss them.

 

Ae should compare with two seasons ago, however people will. I’m sure Top and Rudkin will also. We are still playing possession based football, however we are doing less with it. We need to be more aggressive with it. Playing further up the pitch takes pressure off the defence, that is one Faes brain fart away from conceding.

 

I’m sure our new tactical genius will know all of this though …..

It’s very unfair to compare how we are performing this season with how  we were performing under Enzo 2 years ago. The reality is Cifuentes’ squad is significantly weaker than Enzo’s. No finances to refresh the squad.  Vardy, KDH, Ndidi, Akgun, Doyle, Praet, Iheanacho, Casadei, Justin (playing as a left back) are all better than their replacements. On top of that you have senior players 2 years older and having experienced a second relegation. This squad is the weakest it’s been in probably the last 15 years.

[Noahfence]

1 hour ago, CornwallFox said:

The moment anybody pushes post on something containing the letters "xG" they should be immediately banned. 

 

Admittedly I'd be in trouble for this post.

I understand this point of view and get not everyone likes the data side of football but it does usually give a good indicator in how teams are doing and future trends. 
 

2 years ago Preston won something like 9 out of the first 11 I think but their underlying data was shocking and eventually they dropped like a stone. 
 

You can’t outrun poor underlying numbers like we’re putting up 

[Alf Bentley]

3 hours ago, Sly said:

 

Average possession - 3rd. Interestingly th two teams higher than us are Southampton and Ipswich. Tells its own story. We are 2nd in terms of accurate passes. Basically we mess around a lot and go nowhere is what that says to me.

 

Long passes - 23rd. We aren’t direct in the slightest. 2 years ago we were 7th. Enzo / Marti, different tactics. 

 

 

Saints, Ipswich and us having the highest possession but being well down the table is certainly interesting. But is that because all 3 are still playing too much like PL sides and failing to deploy more mixed tactics against weaker Championship defences? Or is it because Championship sides are using deeper defensive tactics against perceived "PL big boys"? Could be a bit of both...

 

Under Enzo, I don't remember us often playing long through balls to strikers - Mads and Jannik, occasionally. I do remember a lot of long cross-field balls from one wing to the other and long balls from defence (usually Vestergaard, sometimes Faes?) to wide on the wings. Whether that would work again, I don't know, but it certainly seems like we need to mix up tactics more...

[Stadt]

2 hours ago, funkyrobot said:

It’s very unfair to compare how we are performing this season with how  we were performing under Enzo 2 years ago. The reality is Cifuentes’ squad is significantly weaker than Enzo’s. No finances to refresh the squad.  Vardy, KDH, Ndidi, Akgun, Doyle, Praet, Iheanacho, Casadei, Justin (playing as a left back) are all better than their replacements. On top of that you have senior players 2 years older and having experienced a second relegation. This squad is the weakest it’s been in probably the last 15 years.

Probably not but we don't compare favourably to Midddlesborough, Cov, Bristol City and Millwall who don't have parachute payments or weren't as good as Enzo's team either. Do we have the 10th best squad or 18th best on xGD? Absolutely not.

[Swarles Barkley]

We are also outperforming on xC

 

We have more cvnts than your average championship team

[SafewayFox]

2 hours ago, Alf Bentley said:

 

Saints, Ipswich and us having the highest possession but being well down the table is certainly interesting. But is that because all 3 are still playing too much like PL sides and failing to deploy more mixed tactics against weaker Championship defences? Or is it because Championship sides are using deeper defensive tactics against perceived "PL big boys"? Could be a bit of both...

 

Under Enzo, I don't remember us often playing long through balls to strikers - Mads and Jannik, occasionally. I do remember a lot of long cross-field balls from one wing to the other and long balls from defence (usually Vestergaard, sometimes Faes?) to wide on the wings. Whether that would work again, I don't know, but it certainly seems like we need to mix up tactics more...

I think it’s not too harsh on saying that regardless of squad quality that Enzo is likely a better coach/manager than Marti too.

 

Enzo is likely too stubborn to reach his potential but there is a reason he’s at a club like Chelsea, whilst we’re Marti’s biggest club to date.

 

One thing that doesn’t get mentioned enough is how little improvement of a single player that Cooper, Ruud or now Marti have seen under their stewardship.

 

How often would you hear about Enzo (particularly in the many international breaks) working with Stephy/Abdul and seeing the results in flashes during matches.

 

Our squad is worse but our acceptance of any obvious coaching shouldn’t be underestimated.

[hejammy]

Defensively we are majorly made worse by Luke Thomas, in the squad he is currently worst for Challenges Lost, 2nd worst (worst is Ayew) for % of dribblers tackled (and this for a LB is truly woeful) - has a 40% aerial duel win rate (Faes as 35% which is shocking!) - highest fouls committed.

Edited 29 October 2025 by hejammy

[kingfox]

6 hours ago, SafewayFox said:

Great post mate.

 

I think it’s @kingfox that has numerous times posted about our pressing numbers too.

 

In short, we’re passive and have hideous unlikeable players playing for us.

Yep, I started to delve into Opta’s stats after the 1-1 draw against WBA, that’s when certain aspects of our performances began to annoy me. 
 

In all fairness, some of our pressing statistics have improved in recent games, we rank better for PPDA and high turnovers. 
 

Some posters don’t like xG and that’s fair enough, but from the eye test alone, our chance creation has evidently been poor, and it shows up in our statistics. For Fatawu to be leading our xG statistic(Just about squeezes onto Opta’s first page btw) with two defenders in Vestergaard and Ricardo sitting 2nd and 3rd is shambolic. 
 

Our xG and xGC statistics have barely improved for about 5-6 games now. 
 

The eye test shows Cifuentes badly needs to improve us both in attack and defence, and the statistics clearly show it too. 

[Dan]

We are a poor team even at this level. I was saying it when 4th it was totally unsustainable and a fluke. So it proved.

[davieG]

1 hour ago, SafewayFox said:

I think it’s not too harsh on saying that regardless of squad quality that Enzo is likely a better coach/manager than Marti too.

 

Enzo is likely too stubborn to reach his potential but there is a reason he’s at a club like Chelsea, whilst we’re Marti’s biggest club to date.

 

One thing that doesn’t get mentioned enough is how little improvement of a single player that Cooper, Ruud or now Marti have seen under their stewardship.

 

How often would you hear about Enzo (particularly in the many international breaks) working with Stephy/Abdul and seeing the results in flashes during matches.

 

Our squad is worse but our acceptance of any obvious coaching shouldn’t be underestimated.

It seems like he's aware and trying

 

So what’s Marti Cifuentes’ view? The manager says decision-making is more important than technical qualities and he believes he can train Fatawu into making better choices.

“I think it is about coaching,” Cifuentes said. “Football is about decision-making. It’s not just about speed and technique. The most important skill is decision-making.

“Sometimes it might be a very good decision to shoot from distance. Sometimes it can be not the best decision. But I’m not here to blame. I’m here to help the players. I’m here to help them to be better. That’s my job to coach them to take better decisions.”

[Tielemans63]

7 hours ago, Sly said:

Long passes - 23rd. We aren’t direct in the slightest. 2 years ago we were 7th. Enzo / Marti, different tactics. 

Interceptions per match against- 23rd.

 

Great post mate. Interesting stuff.

 

These two stats stood out to me. The first one especially. The absolutely slavish devotion to possession based football and patient build up.....it makes no sense as we're far too predictable. Throwing in long passes here and there can help us put more pressure on the opposition and try to force errors.

 

This whole Man City cosplay thing we've been doing for the past few years is a) embarrassing b) mostly awful to watch and c) is ineffective, as your stats suggest. It's actually completely counter-intuitive to keep playing this style when we're patently not very good at it. 

 

The lack of interceptions doesn't surprise me at all - our midfield is regularly out-fought and out-thought - not exactly a shock when your options include Winks, Skipp and Soumare. The last two are barely even professional footballers.

[Stadt]

8 minutes ago, Tielemans63 said:

out-fought and out-thought

We don't have an Ndidi-like defensive midfielder, even not quite at his peak he was still a fantastic ball winner and our fanbase probably took him for granted.

 

Any combination of Winks, James, Skipp, Soumare is lacking defensively. I think we may end up seeing Choudhury in midfield again (good enough for a 90+ point season at Sheffield Utd last season).

[Sly]

5 hours ago, funkyrobot said:

It’s very unfair to compare how we are performing this season with how  we were performing under Enzo 2 years ago. The reality is Cifuentes’ squad is significantly weaker than Enzo’s. No finances to refresh the squad.  Vardy, KDH, Ndidi, Akgun, Doyle, Praet, Iheanacho, Casadei, Justin (playing as a left back) are all better than their replacements. On top of that you have senior players 2 years older and having experienced a second relegation. This squad is the weakest it’s been in probably the last 15 years.

I don’t disagree, we should never have been relegated.

[Sly]

1 hour ago, SafewayFox said:

I think it’s not too harsh on saying that regardless of squad quality that Enzo is likely a better coach/manager than Marti too.

 

Enzo is likely too stubborn to reach his potential but there is a reason he’s at a club like Chelsea, whilst we’re Marti’s biggest club to date.

 

One thing that doesn’t get mentioned enough is how little improvement of a single player that Cooper, Ruud or now Marti have seen under their stewardship.

 

How often would you hear about Enzo (particularly in the many international breaks) working with Stephy/Abdul and seeing the results in flashes during matches.

 

Our squad is worse but our acceptance of any obvious coaching shouldn’t be underestimated.

I’d play devils advocate and state players like Winks, Mavididi, Faes etc have gone backward. 

[Sly]

26 minutes ago, Stadt said:

We don't have an Ndidi-like defensive midfielder, even not quite at his peak he was still a fantastic ball winner and our fanbase probably took him for granted.

 

Any combination of Winks, James, Skipp, Soumare is lacking defensively. I think we may end up seeing Choudhury in midfield again (good enough for a 90+ point season at Sheffield Utd last season).

If you look at the underlying for our entire midfield, they sit in the lowest percentiles in the defensive stats. 

[SuperMike]

1 hour ago, Sly said:

If you look at the underlying for our entire midfield, they sit in the lowest percentiles in the defensive stats. 

.......and aint too great in the creativity stakes!