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We have a chance creation problem. This isn’t the only stat that matters but I’ll use it for sake of this discussion:
our best chance creator is Saka whose on 22 chances created which is the 6th best in the league
our next best chance creator is Odegaard with 15 whose the 22nd best in the league.
here’s where it gets grim. Our next best chance creator is Ben White at 9 chances fucking created which is the 60th best in the league.
It’s a huge issue that I can’t put my finger on because we have some of the best positional and territorial dominance in the whole league. We frequently get the ball into the box but we cannnot consistent convert that presence into shots on goal. This isn’t just down to Odegaard or a lack of someone actually replacing what Xhaka did for us last season because the system itself is working the players are just flat not executing in the final third and it’s costing us points.
Hard to create something when a large majority of the teams we play are happy to give up ALL of the possession and just sit in their box all game. And when we do create, we fail to convert those chances into goals due to poor finishing. Unless Saka produces some insane individual play out of nowhere, we’re unable to do anything.
We actually don’t have a finishing problem. In fact our finishing is above average this season. We have 16xg and 18 goals so we’re performing above our expected. But we are 7th in xg although it’s all very close and I think we’ve played against pretty good defenses all season aside from Fulham but yes it’s still a chance creation issue. City are dealing with it too right now but they have the best creator in the world coming back from injury soon.
Your last point might just be the answer. Players aren’t clicking or are messing about too much in the final third, wasting our territorial dominance.
At Chelsea this weekend this was clear to see. Off the ball we were excellent and generally pinned Chelsea back to their own half/third. But then we’d give the ball away for fun once we got there and failed to get shots off in good situations.
Maybe has something to do with our starting front 3 not getting a ton of time together yet this season, but that definitely needs to be fixed up.
Stop looking at stats and fucking relax. Holy shit this sub is something else. How about we have no losses on the year, we just beat city and had a gutsy away comeback at Stamford bridge and it’s like the sky is falling down.
Yeah cause when has stats ever meant anything! The club laughs in the face of data analysis and interpretation!
And all those are on our left hand side. The new problem is teams now block out the middle. The solution is a creator from deep. City have KDB, Liverpool have Trent. We need Vieira to come in and step up, he’s the only one in the team who can do that. We also need another runner on the outside on the right to stretch teams. Basically we need to evolve again. Defensively we are solid its now offensively that we need to get to that next step