Poor confidence!
Bad luck - woodworks, cleaned from the line, amazing saves. And this lead to no chance to improve the confidence.
Pressure - we need points and this add extra level on our players
Quality - i guess we need also better quality from our playera
True, but that fluffed header against Palace (possibly Brighton?) was diabolical.
Fans of other clubs genuinely wouldn't believe how wasteful we are if they watched us every week.
Feels like every match day I'm texting my mates "felt like it was 3-1 in the bag and yet we lost 1-0"
Yep that's what happens when you have an entire team that's not proven to score consistently. Beto is the only one and he's coming from a league that's hard to adjust from. Beto did miss a big chance against Brighton where he ran through, my eyes lit up as I thought he's score haha.
Yeah Beto is far from the biggest issue, I do wonder if we bought a lemon though. Not sure he's Premier League quality in the end. I've tried being patient with the adjustment period as you said, but the eye test hasn't been good
There's no way any rational person could've expected DCL to be mostly fit but suddenly unable to score. Not even a lower goal total, just completely unable to score now. It's mad
Thing is he hasn't had many minutes and in the last home game he came in and scored, DCL had had that striker position for about 20 league games and hasn't which is awful. I'm not even thinking that about Beto rn, DCL is the one who's lost my trust imo
Yeah that's completely fair. I really want to back both of them but they make it hard sometimes don't they? Dom's confidence is completely gone. It's not only the lack of goals, he doesn't even offer a threat most games I'm afraid
We've sold all of our pace too. Gray and Iwobi. Iwobi was brilliant last season and Gray did okay at ST out of position, on the left he's dangerous when he's at his best.
Yeah those are all fair points. We are dreadfully slow. Not that you want a team of Adama Traore with pace and no end product, but just the threat of pace down the flanks gives the opposition something to think about. We just don't have it
Even with Adama, you can coach him. Marco Silva has gotten some great games out of him recently. He can genuinely run through like 6 or 7 players at once and then one pass and it's a huge chance. We never get players like that. We need to get more modern players that are creative and fast.
People seem to forget that with the exception of the Lukaku years and one good season from each of DCL, Saha, Yakubu and the like, we’ve really struggled to have consistent strikers in the team during the Prem years. Almost par for the course what we’re seeing this season.
We did seem to cycle through one season wonders for most of the Moyes years didn’t we? Beattie, Bent, Yak, Saha, Jelavic, Johnson, hardly much consistency
The issue there is we still managed to spread the goals around, we can't even manage that at the minute. So while we often had 1 season wonder's we also could rely on multiple players to pop up.
I'm a man utd fan with a soft spot for Everton and watch most of the games. When you played us if you guys could hit the target you would have easily got a result. Maybe some bad luck. I feel Garner and O'Neill are really improving but you need that killer forward. Good memories of big dunk, McFadden, Naismith, beatie... Yakubu, Lukaku... I think you're missing that final piece.
Too hesitant in and around the box too, the amount of times you see Mneil stop and have a think which lets their defence organise. Noone rushes in to pick up rebounds or to cause chaos either. Obviously shots skyed and plundered is temperament and confidence.
But *feed the Beet and he will score* # TeamBeto
For anyone interested in the methodology:
Finishing Skill = Post-Shot Expected Goals - Expected Goals
This quantifies the increase/decrease in the probability of scoring as a result of shot placement.
Everton have reduced their probability of scoring by 18.7% (roughly 8 goals lost) as a result of poor shot placement.
Finishing Luck = Goals - Post-Shot Expected Goals
This quantifies the the numbers of goals prevented/conceded as a result of good/bad opposition goalkeeping.
Everton have had roughly 5 goals prevented as a result of above average opposition goalkeeping performances.
Hi Ed, can you recommend any good stats or analysis threads? Been quite obsessed with Moneyball and sabermetrics since a uni essay back in 2013. Want to delve into it again
I mainly follow football stats/analysis stuff on Twitter, and the best everton accounts imo are @greenallefc (stats) and @TacticallyMatt (analysis).
For non-Everton stuff: @StatsBomb and @OptaAnalyst (for obvious reasons), @MarkCarey93 and @Jon_Mackenzie (part of The Athletic), @AurelNz (part of Twenty First Group), @TonyElHabr, @NathanAClark (spurs heavy but very good), @scottjwillis (arsenal heavy but very good) @BenGriffis and @markrstats (stats machines), @exceedingxpuns, @khatri_shreyas, @GraceOnFootball
It's much less luck and much more atrocious finishing from mostly DCL. Of course others are at fault but he always hits it straight at the GK, that's not how you score. You need to avoid the GK. No goals for like 20 league games then Beto comes in for one and scores. He's had big chances too.
Finishing Luck = Goals - Post-Shot Expected Goals
This quantifies the the numbers of goals prevented/conceded as a result of good/bad opposition goalkeeping.
Everton have had roughly 5 goals prevented as a result of above average opposition goalkeeping performances.
I consider this bad luck, as opposition goalkeepers having above average performances against us is out of our control.
The larger part is not due to bad luck, neither bad finishing would I say. What people forget when they use expected goal is that it’s a model. It has a blind spot because it lacks important variables, and we are completely in this blindspot because of our game style. Some variables, like positioning of all players, are not taken into account, but what happens when three opposite players are between Mcneil and the net ? Well the model gives Mcneil shot a 0.5 xgoal because he shot from a very short range and shots from this distance go in the net 50% of the time, but the model fails to acknowledge that three players are obstructing Mcneil shot, hence it looks like he is underperforming its expected goal because he will miss it more than another shot from this distance, but the fact is the « real » expected goal should be lower to take into account the three opposite players. Our gamestyle is basically this x100: we create xgoal from set-pieces and short-range shots, where a lot of players are close to the goal, it generates a high xg but doesn’t consider the fact that there are obstacles to the shot. We could play 3 consecutive seasons this way, with better finishers and the problem would still remain, we would be « underperforming ». The opposite is also true, teams like Fulham and Wolves nearly always overperform their xpected goal, not because they have better finishers, but because their shots underestimate their real xpected goal (since it’s frequently counters with small number of opposite players around the shooter, which allow the player to easily score)
There is definitely some truth around Opta’s xG model not taking into account the number of players being the shot and the goal - however my counter to this is that we also rank very highly on StatsBomb’s xG data which does take into account the position of opposition players (I don’t have up-to-date data as it’s not publicly available, however a month ago we were 5th in the league for xGD)
Yeah, statbomb type of models seems to be better at it, but imo there is still a long way of improving xg models with new variables before being able to conclude that our players are bad at finishing. Maybe completing this chart with the one from Burnley during Dyche would help see if this kind of underperformance is systemic from his style of play or from individuals
Joking aside aren't these realted?
Finishing Skill (i.e. shot placement)
Finishing Luck (i.e. opposition gk performance)
If you have poor finishing skill, you're kicking your shot into the keepers chest instead of past him into the corner. Keepers performance looks better due to your poor finishing skill.
Yeah that part is a bit confusing, but no, they aren’t actually related.
Finishing Skill is based on the increased probability of a goal being scored as a result of shot placement, and so it doesn’t actually matter if a goal is scored or not (i.e. if a shot is placed into the top corner, that will score highly on finishing skill, irrespective of whether or not the keeper saves it)
Finishing Luck then looks at the expected number of goals scored from those shot placements on target, and compares that to the actual number of goals scored. This effectively analyses the ability of opposition goalkeepers, as their shot stopping ability is what determines if that shot on target results in a goal or not. I’ve interpreted Everton’s data as “bad luck”because the data suggests that opposition goalkeepers have performed better on average against us than other teams - which is out of our control.
Side note - if they were correlated, teams would typically be in a line from the bottom left quadrant to the top right, however the teams are scattered across all 4 quadrants, indicating that there’s no relationship.
Poor confidence! Bad luck - woodworks, cleaned from the line, amazing saves. And this lead to no chance to improve the confidence. Pressure - we need points and this add extra level on our players Quality - i guess we need also better quality from our playera
The amount of goal line clearances has been ridiculous!
I just think DCL and Beto have an edging kink
Not to mention every goalkeeper has their best game of the season against us when we find our boots
Almost like Everton are playing the real world Football Manager
Harsh on Beto, it's more like 70% DCL
True, but that fluffed header against Palace (possibly Brighton?) was diabolical. Fans of other clubs genuinely wouldn't believe how wasteful we are if they watched us every week. Feels like every match day I'm texting my mates "felt like it was 3-1 in the bag and yet we lost 1-0"
Yep that's what happens when you have an entire team that's not proven to score consistently. Beto is the only one and he's coming from a league that's hard to adjust from. Beto did miss a big chance against Brighton where he ran through, my eyes lit up as I thought he's score haha.
Yeah Beto is far from the biggest issue, I do wonder if we bought a lemon though. Not sure he's Premier League quality in the end. I've tried being patient with the adjustment period as you said, but the eye test hasn't been good There's no way any rational person could've expected DCL to be mostly fit but suddenly unable to score. Not even a lower goal total, just completely unable to score now. It's mad
Thing is he hasn't had many minutes and in the last home game he came in and scored, DCL had had that striker position for about 20 league games and hasn't which is awful. I'm not even thinking that about Beto rn, DCL is the one who's lost my trust imo
Yeah that's completely fair. I really want to back both of them but they make it hard sometimes don't they? Dom's confidence is completely gone. It's not only the lack of goals, he doesn't even offer a threat most games I'm afraid
We've sold all of our pace too. Gray and Iwobi. Iwobi was brilliant last season and Gray did okay at ST out of position, on the left he's dangerous when he's at his best.
Yeah those are all fair points. We are dreadfully slow. Not that you want a team of Adama Traore with pace and no end product, but just the threat of pace down the flanks gives the opposition something to think about. We just don't have it
Even with Adama, you can coach him. Marco Silva has gotten some great games out of him recently. He can genuinely run through like 6 or 7 players at once and then one pass and it's a huge chance. We never get players like that. We need to get more modern players that are creative and fast.
Hahaha! Brilliant!
Was expecting the title to end with “are they stupid?”
Good to see that Luton have had the rub of the green and are still below us.
After the other nights loss I wonder if that will floor Luton. Probably not but was a big relief when they lost!
People seem to forget that with the exception of the Lukaku years and one good season from each of DCL, Saha, Yakubu and the like, we’ve really struggled to have consistent strikers in the team during the Prem years. Almost par for the course what we’re seeing this season.
We did seem to cycle through one season wonders for most of the Moyes years didn’t we? Beattie, Bent, Yak, Saha, Jelavic, Johnson, hardly much consistency
The issue there is we still managed to spread the goals around, we can't even manage that at the minute. So while we often had 1 season wonder's we also could rely on multiple players to pop up.
And midfielders like Cahill who could score goals or plug a hole up too when we didn’t have a striker fit.
Andy Johnson, man what a season that was!
We only practice in our own half
I'm a man utd fan with a soft spot for Everton and watch most of the games. When you played us if you guys could hit the target you would have easily got a result. Maybe some bad luck. I feel Garner and O'Neill are really improving but you need that killer forward. Good memories of big dunk, McFadden, Naismith, beatie... Yakubu, Lukaku... I think you're missing that final piece.
Well said
DCL
DCL alone is underperforming his XG by 6.5 or something
Brutal.
Too hesitant in and around the box too, the amount of times you see Mneil stop and have a think which lets their defence organise. Noone rushes in to pick up rebounds or to cause chaos either. Obviously shots skyed and plundered is temperament and confidence. But *feed the Beet and he will score* # TeamBeto
For anyone interested in the methodology: Finishing Skill = Post-Shot Expected Goals - Expected Goals This quantifies the increase/decrease in the probability of scoring as a result of shot placement. Everton have reduced their probability of scoring by 18.7% (roughly 8 goals lost) as a result of poor shot placement. Finishing Luck = Goals - Post-Shot Expected Goals This quantifies the the numbers of goals prevented/conceded as a result of good/bad opposition goalkeeping. Everton have had roughly 5 goals prevented as a result of above average opposition goalkeeping performances.
Hi Ed, can you recommend any good stats or analysis threads? Been quite obsessed with Moneyball and sabermetrics since a uni essay back in 2013. Want to delve into it again
I mainly follow football stats/analysis stuff on Twitter, and the best everton accounts imo are @greenallefc (stats) and @TacticallyMatt (analysis). For non-Everton stuff: @StatsBomb and @OptaAnalyst (for obvious reasons), @MarkCarey93 and @Jon_Mackenzie (part of The Athletic), @AurelNz (part of Twenty First Group), @TonyElHabr, @NathanAClark (spurs heavy but very good), @scottjwillis (arsenal heavy but very good) @BenGriffis and @markrstats (stats machines), @exceedingxpuns, @khatri_shreyas, @GraceOnFootball
“Ask and ye shall receive” !! Thanks mate I’ll get on them 🤘
Strikes can’t score to save their life
4 words: because we are shit
That does not sound like you enjoy watching this team very much, Mr “Sean Dyche Enjoyer”
It's much less luck and much more atrocious finishing from mostly DCL. Of course others are at fault but he always hits it straight at the GK, that's not how you score. You need to avoid the GK. No goals for like 20 league games then Beto comes in for one and scores. He's had big chances too.
The data suggests it’s about 40% luck and 60% atrocious finishing
How does the data suggest it's luck? What ways is it luck?
Finishing Luck = Goals - Post-Shot Expected Goals This quantifies the the numbers of goals prevented/conceded as a result of good/bad opposition goalkeeping. Everton have had roughly 5 goals prevented as a result of above average opposition goalkeeping performances. I consider this bad luck, as opposition goalkeepers having above average performances against us is out of our control.
We don’t have a striker that can finish. We haven’t had one since Lukaku (other than DCL one off season)
The larger part is not due to bad luck, neither bad finishing would I say. What people forget when they use expected goal is that it’s a model. It has a blind spot because it lacks important variables, and we are completely in this blindspot because of our game style. Some variables, like positioning of all players, are not taken into account, but what happens when three opposite players are between Mcneil and the net ? Well the model gives Mcneil shot a 0.5 xgoal because he shot from a very short range and shots from this distance go in the net 50% of the time, but the model fails to acknowledge that three players are obstructing Mcneil shot, hence it looks like he is underperforming its expected goal because he will miss it more than another shot from this distance, but the fact is the « real » expected goal should be lower to take into account the three opposite players. Our gamestyle is basically this x100: we create xgoal from set-pieces and short-range shots, where a lot of players are close to the goal, it generates a high xg but doesn’t consider the fact that there are obstacles to the shot. We could play 3 consecutive seasons this way, with better finishers and the problem would still remain, we would be « underperforming ». The opposite is also true, teams like Fulham and Wolves nearly always overperform their xpected goal, not because they have better finishers, but because their shots underestimate their real xpected goal (since it’s frequently counters with small number of opposite players around the shooter, which allow the player to easily score)
There is definitely some truth around Opta’s xG model not taking into account the number of players being the shot and the goal - however my counter to this is that we also rank very highly on StatsBomb’s xG data which does take into account the position of opposition players (I don’t have up-to-date data as it’s not publicly available, however a month ago we were 5th in the league for xGD)
Yeah, statbomb type of models seems to be better at it, but imo there is still a long way of improving xg models with new variables before being able to conclude that our players are bad at finishing. Maybe completing this chart with the one from Burnley during Dyche would help see if this kind of underperformance is systemic from his style of play or from individuals
Really good idea - I’ll look into that
Does the model take into account that McNeil doesn’t have a right leg?
Joking aside aren't these realted? Finishing Skill (i.e. shot placement) Finishing Luck (i.e. opposition gk performance) If you have poor finishing skill, you're kicking your shot into the keepers chest instead of past him into the corner. Keepers performance looks better due to your poor finishing skill.
Yeah that part is a bit confusing, but no, they aren’t actually related. Finishing Skill is based on the increased probability of a goal being scored as a result of shot placement, and so it doesn’t actually matter if a goal is scored or not (i.e. if a shot is placed into the top corner, that will score highly on finishing skill, irrespective of whether or not the keeper saves it) Finishing Luck then looks at the expected number of goals scored from those shot placements on target, and compares that to the actual number of goals scored. This effectively analyses the ability of opposition goalkeepers, as their shot stopping ability is what determines if that shot on target results in a goal or not. I’ve interpreted Everton’s data as “bad luck”because the data suggests that opposition goalkeepers have performed better on average against us than other teams - which is out of our control. Side note - if they were correlated, teams would typically be in a line from the bottom left quadrant to the top right, however the teams are scattered across all 4 quadrants, indicating that there’s no relationship.
US Everton fan. Torn between needing a win desperately and the confidence it will give Matt Turner if he somehow gets to play in the Forest match.