Date that article was published: May 22, 2018

Summary of Article

This article discusses an important statistic in Football/Soccer called expected goals (xG) that attempts to offer an objective view of pundit commentary.

## [1] "He should have scored that!"      "He shouldn't miss that!"         
## [3] "He's got to score those chances!" "He missed a sitter!"             
## [5] "What a chance!"

Expected Goals is a normative statistic that determines the number of goals a team or a player should have scored in a game based on the number of shots and chances they created in a match. It takes into effect several factors that account for the type of shot that is taken such as the angle in relation to the goal post, the dominant foot of the player, the number of players in or near the path of the ball trajectory, and many more. It takes the average of these probabilities and averages them for a specific player or team. This averaged value serves as a benchmark to evaluate the performance of a player or team on an individual matchday.

## [1] "Angle of the shot"                    
## [2] "Assist type"                          
## [3] "Shot location"                        
## [4] "The in-game situation"                
## [5] "The proximity of opposition defenders"
## [6] "Distance from goal"

Basic Article Information

Likes Tags
3 Scientific Papers, Football

Author Information

Guillermo Martinez-Arastey has extensive experience in applied analytics and data collection & management, having worked for over 7 years in technology corporations like Microsoft, Amazon and Expedia. During that time, he optimized business performance by creating innovative analytics solutions, advanced data collection processes and robust data pipelines to extract valuable insights from large datasets. He later transitioned into the world of sport, where he applies the techniques and processes acquired during his time in the technological industry to optimize athlete and team performance within the field of Sports Performance Analysis.

## [1] "https://www.sportperformanceanalysis.com/about"

Sports Performance Analysis

What Do I Think?

This is the first time I truly explored advanced sport statistics in my favorite sport-Soccer. I have been aware of advanced metrics in the past, however I usually chose to ignore them because they painted my favorite players as inefficient ball hoggers. I relied on eye-test and highlight reels alone to make judgements about players ability since they usually depicted them at their very best. However, reading this article and others on the topic of xG and other advanced sports metrics have made me realize the validity and importance of advanced sports analytics because I now understand that almost all professional players can reenact those highlight reels and plays and there is not much that differentiates a random player with my favorite players based on highlights alone. The real skill in professional sports is the ability to replicate highlight plays in high pressure situations in a consistent, stable manner.