05 Mar 2024 00:07:24
I know Xg stats aren’t everyones interest, so stop reading here if so. But for those interested:

We’re now at an Xg underperformance of 18.1, absolute insanity. The second biggest underperformers are Chelsea, their underperformance… 8.1. How on earth are we this bad at taking chances.

The leagues most clinical side (greatest Xg overperformers) are Arsenal with an Xg over performance of 8.4. This means there is about the same difference in Xg over-under performance between the 19th worst finishers (Chelsea) and the best finishers (Arsenal) , as there is between us in 20th and Chelsea in 19th. Absolutely unreal.

If it weren’t for our solid defending (4th best in terms of Goals Against and Xg against) , we would be absolutely in the mud.

Some may disagree with me here, but for me Sean Dyche is responsible for the system and approach that affords the players the best chance to win each game. It’s the players responsibility to put that ball in the net. We obviously aren’t lacking the chances created under Dyche’s system nor the strong defensive numbers, but my god are we being let down in front of goal by our forwards.

I know points on the board and goals in the net are what truly matters, but these underlying numbers do show that Dyche system is not leaving our forwards to “feed off scraps” as many seem to suggest. We are just truly the worst finishers in the league.

All I can hope is that for the next month or so Dyche and his staff rip up their training ground plans and only run bloody finishing drills.

There’s hope blues, and I do think we get out of this under Dyche.

(All Xg stats from Understat, but note that different models for calculating Xg may vary slightly. The overall points and trends I point out do remain true regardless of where you get your Xg stats from though)

1.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 00:25:39
Sorry, typing this out late at night and made a slight blunder. The difference between us and Chelsea is about 10 Xg underperformance, and there is about a 16 Xg difference in under-over performance between Chelsea and Arsenal.

It’s more like the difference between us as the worst finishers 20th for underperformance of Xg and the next worst in 19th for underperformance. Is the same as the difference between under-over performance between 19th and about 5th.

In any case, the intention was to highlight just how far behind the pack we are in terms of the quality of our chance taking.

2.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 07:03:22
? Run that by me again ?.

3.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 07:27:31
TMH old school me mate, I can see with my own eyes where we are good and where crap. Football (soccer) is not a static game (NFL) needing charts notebooks tablets etc! In the end all stats do is tell us what we already know.

4.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 07:51:30
In simpler terms, we cannot finish the chances we create, we are neither skilled enough or clinical enough. SD cannot finish the chances himself, and his set up leads to these chances being created, albeit in a style that’s not too pleasing on the eye. You’d like to think that we will click at some point, but I’m not that confident.

5.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 14:38:29
On Saturday the crowd was dead, all the spirit knocked out of them, and couldn’t do anything to lift the team.
I’m not saying it’s on us, as those£100k a week players are the ones that kick the ball, but we just look completely done this time.
Exhausted and not even that bothered if we go down.
Maybe for the best.

6.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 16:37:57
Relegation is never for the best. As for crowd lifting the players. It’s about time these so called professional players put in a shift to lift the crowd.
After all you don’t go to watch a play and stand up and read the lines your self. Getting really tired of people blaming supporters, were feckin burnt out, and we pay for the privilege.

7.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 17:04:55
As soon as the tempo rised and we played 3 or 4 quick passes, the crowd were up. I’m not cheering long balls and misplaced passes.

{Ed025's Note - to be fair JB sean cant win, at 1-1 we really went for it and committed more players forward, that meant defensively we were a bit stretched mate, mind you we should have been 3 up before that..

8.) 05 Mar 2024
05 Mar 2024 21:08:02
That’s been the case all season really, Ed. SD has probably done as well as can be expected with the squad we have. Most of us would have taken the points we should have on the board at this stage of the season., and we should have more. I can accept the reality of the situation, but I don’t want our final season at Goodison or our first season in our new stadium to bear witness to the dross we’re watching currently.

{Ed025's Note - i cant argue with that JB mate..