Round 6

[CroJack]

Middlesbrough (blue) v Swansea (pink) Spider Chart



​

Middlesbrough made more tackles, blocked more shots, had more corner kicks and what is most important more expected goals.
Swansea had more shots, shots on target, quality shots, shots outside box and successful dribbles.

These numbers confirm what we already know.

Swansea haven't had much success in creating high quality chances against Luton and Middlesbrough. Too many shots are being fired from outside of the opposition box. Especially Piroe is trying to shoot from 25-30 yards out. No doubt he hasn't scored from open play yet. We have been too static, we have lacked creativity and our crossing is poor. We managed only 3 accurate crosses against Middlesbrough and without that penalty we created miserable 0.75 expected goals, which is not enough chances created to score 1 goal.

On the other side of the pitch we struggle to block opposition crosses and shots, and, most importantly, we give away high quality chances.
We concede from a) counter-attacks initiated by our defensive mistakes (either sloppy passes or dispossessed in dangerous areas), b) allowed (not blocked) crosses, and c) goalkeeper mistakes. Against Middlesbrough it was one sloppy backward pass and one allowed (not blocked) cross.


Our impotence up front can be seen in the Championship xGoals and xPoints tables. Swansea are not top team anymore when it comes to xGoals, and not one of the top teams when it comes to expected points. With other words, our attacking form has been in decline lately. Still, we have created chances for 15 goals so far but scored only 5 because our attackers have been poor at converting clear-cut chances. Sheffield United attackers have scored 10 goals from almost the same number of expected goals. Preston attackers have been even worse, they have scored only 1 goal from 9 expected goals. Norwich, Luton, Birmingham and Cardiff are other underperforming clubs when it comes to converting expected goals to real goals. Blackburn are interesting. Three rounds ago I predicted that Blackburn's form was not sustainable due to their low xGoals numbers and since they've lost their next three games.

Here is the real Goals For Table




And here is the xGoalsAgainst Table
You can see here which teams have best and which worst defence



This is the real Goal Against Table
Some defences masively overperfom. Preston, Rotherham, Luton, Watford,
Sheffield United, Wigan, Blackpool...
On the other hand, Middlesbrough, Stoke and Burnley have conceded more than they deserved

​

 

[CroJack]

This is xPoints or Justice Table

As you can see, we have dropped down to joint 8th-12th place, which is actually still not so bad.
We are only 3 xPoints from the second place. As you know, we should have won 3 and lost 3 games.




And the Real Points Table

The overperforming (lucky) clubs so far are Reading, Hull, Watford, Rotherham and Blackburn.
The underperforming (unlucky) clubs are Swansea, Birmingham, Luton, Middlesbrough, WBA and Stoke.
Steve Bruce WBA should be top of the table.

​

 

[Yankee_Jack]

Bottom line ... we are playing like an inferior team, with an inferior brand of football easily contained, with a lack of cohesion that is easily exploited. Couple this with lame individual performances and those that are bringing their A game (e.g. Manning, Allen) are lugging around too much dead weight. That we are routinely make substitutions at half-time and now before half-time indicates that something is seriously wrong with match preparation, team selection and performance.

Fisher must be betting against us on the side. I've never seen a keeper either fail to dive or make such lame attempts. It's not like the ball is bring drilled past him by Bobby Charlton and it's in and out before he can blink - you can't NOT make an effort. And if that wasn't bad enough, Fisher is now repeatedly flapping at crosses/corners with one-handed punches ... usually keepers have been deselected for that lack of technical ability by the time they reach 16 perhaps earlier in more competitive developmental programs. Any notion that Fisher is going to "develop" into a resellable asset is delusional - there are just too many flaws to correct. So ... what's the point of playing him. Flogging a dead horse ... but surely Benda has more to offer now and more upside down the road. At this point I'd even pull DeVries out of retirement and stick him in goal - can't possibly be any weaker.

We're now 6 games into the season and there's no plateau in sight it's a downward spiral. We played lower level clubs in the preseason, delivered mediocre performances against them, nonetheless patted ourselves gratuitously on the back, and now the truth has been laid bare. We have the worst GD in the league, marginally off the bottom with the two clubs below us with games in hand.

 

[Yankee_Jack]

I think @CroJack's analysis posts should come with an X rating ... they're just too gory for the faint of heart to read.