Sticking tin hat on here a bit as I know the data stuff is not everyone’s cup of tea and not entirely sure which side I stand on Maresca but this is the XG difference table which has us clear 4th best in terms of the gap between chances created and coughed up.

On 26/03/2025 at 01:19, GeremiBeadle said:

Sticking tin hat on here a bit as I know the data stuff is not everyone’s cup of tea and not entirely sure which side I stand on Maresca but this is the XG difference table which has us clear 4th best in terms of the gap between chances created and coughed up.

These XG tables are tricky because xG is not a measure of performance, it is a measure of shot/chance quality (which we assume is loosely correlated with performance - better teams make better quality chances). Nottingham Forest are more likely to concede a goal than score one, yet they are likely to finish above us convincingly this season.

The table shows that we are much more likely to score a goal than concede one, but that is an absolute minimum level of performance. More telling is that there is a clear gap between Liverpool/City/Arsenal and the rest of the league, and we have to both increase our xG while decreasing our xGA to be in the same bracket.

It was the same last year

We finished 6th but the xPTS (points allocated by xG not final score) had us in 5th

I don't think we've been a very clinical side for a good while now (maybe under Conte, maybe as far back as Mourinho mk2)