Ramsey is a great player when healthy. He also does more than Alli (passing and defending, which Alli doesn’t do really at all). Alli is probably a better goal scorer, though, and scoring goals is kind of a big deal. But fvck Alli, anyway.
iwobi just needs to be on the pitch, period. one of the few kids we have produced with as much footballing intelligence and sense as they have physical and technical prowess. and one of our few intelligent offensive players.
I still think Ramsey's lack of defensive positional sense kills our midfield, but it's hard to really place blame for this anywhere other than the manager.
The story of the data is arsenal are underperforming chance quality both defensively and offensively. It could just be random variation but this has happened in a few seasons now/ When you look at those 17 chances chances created by ozil in the first games all of which were missed I do start to wonder about the goals scoring quality of this team Secondly, yet again Arsenal continue to give up more goals than would be suggested by the chances created This all suggests some fundamental issues with the tactics and player quality. Producing a table this way assesses teams much better than ranking by xG difference as many do. Burnley for example are much higher in our example than they would be on other methods as each match is assessed rather than just aggregating everything together and ranking.— Simon Gleave (@SimonGleave) November 7, 2017
This season, Arsenal are underperforming chance quality defensively, but have performed at roughly chance quality in attack. Last season seemed like Arsenal overperformed xG in both attack and defense. I thought you of all people knew about small sample sizes, Jitters. Based on xG, City is far and away the best team in the league (duh!), followed by Sperz (also pretty clear), and then there's a tier with Arsenal, Liverpool, United, and Chelsea, with ranking depending on which xG model you use. Top four will come down to injuries/luck, IMO, so if we want to play in Big Cup next season, need to win the Europa League to guarantee it. PL. City look well worth their lead at the top. Palace are doing remarkably well in the main table and Leicester’s shot stats are looking pretty great right now. pic.twitter.com/Rg7DIZsZkt— PM (@ThatGooner) November 8, 2017
Depends whose model you are using. Simon has Arsenal underperforming xG at both ends. I agree it could just be variation, but I raised it in response to Laca's radar. Lacking an elite goal scorer has been an issue since RvP left and I maintain that Ozil would have much better results if he was playing with a guy like RvP who frequently got into good shooting positions. This is also the reason why Ozil's combination with Giroud was important. Giroud has borderline elite data. Trouble is he breaks the team. Just another day in Arsenal land.
He's not elite - just decent. Especially his shot volume is too low across his career. If he could deliver peak Giroud goal scoring it could work out because he adds a lot more to the team and Alexis is elite. This is the same as why the team plays better overall with Welbeck. Anyway - on this stats bomb guide to their radars he would not be considered top 20 for example. https://statsbomb.com/2016/07/who-is-alexander-lacazette-and-should-arsenal-spend-40m-on-him/
Ramsey's shooting is bigly bad. Of course we all hope he will repeat his great season but it seems more likely than not he was just really streaky.
I'm confused. How does Laca's radar, where we take issue with his shot volume, tie into whether Arsenal are chronically underperforming xG in both attack and defense over a ten game sample? And again, last season's Arsenal dramatically overperformed xG in attack and defense (last season's team was Wenger's worst team in a while).
Our thought process here is that elite goalscorers shoot from high probability positions, and shoot a lot from those positions. Example: Robert Lewandowski, who's finishing numbers are middling (G ~= xG most seasons), but is a shot monster; see also Harry Kane, who is also a shot monster. Lacazette simply doesn't shoot enough from those positions. Don't know why that is, but it's not simply an Arsenal problem - the volume issues go back to his Lyon days. Still a very good player, and the player Arsenal needed, and maybe he'll get better at creating a yard of space as the season progresses.
he is not an elite goalscorer He doesnt shoot enough even though he genuinely is an ice cold finisher. Some of his issue is that he isnt that fast, but the shooting thing is bizarre. they don't. I sometimes wonder if Jitty fully understands the numbers he touts. Lacazette's issues are something beyond Arsenal. It is why I was always hesitant on getting him. THat and he really is not as fast as people think.
I think it's a combo of size (so he's not great on set pieces) and him not being quite as quick as some others, meaning he can't create a yard of space consistently. His pace is less of an issue. He's not 2011 Theo Walcott, but he seems faster than Alexis.
Our strikers all have the problem that they only make one move. When you go look at peak RvP he would make 3 or 4 moves before he lost the defender. None of our players really make multiple moves without the ball.
Read the radar Based admittedly on small sample size Laca offers around .5 expected goals per game. An elite striker is offering something more like .75 or higher That's a 50% difference and goes some way to explaining why Arsenal aren't challenging for the title.
You made these connections to shot volume and team xG. I simply said that if Arsenal had a high xG striker > .75 many more of Ozil's chances would be converted into assists/goals. I fail to see how that is controversial and is clearly a reason Arsenal is not an elite attacking side. Indeed if we return to Simon Gleave's numbers Arsenal have two different problems 1. Underperformance of xG (could be variation) 2. Relative xG is too low to win the title So the team is not good enough at scoring and also not good enough at creating great shooting positions. But as we know from all the analysis of RvP - both those issues can be solved at the same time by an elite 9 who can get into those shooting locations
Completely agree the shot volume is a massive issue. I've made the same argument about Hazard (and Ozil). If you only shoot 2-3 times per game you are not going to score heavily in the longer term.
It is also why Giroud is statistically a borderline elite striker. He has the size, power, strength when close to goal, to make runs that are hard to defend. Further away from goal he sucks and makes the team one dimensional. This is also why Utd so often resort to route 1 to Fellini in recent years. He is hard to stop - yet makes their midfield play terrible.
In these situations I fall back on a corporate analysis I learned when I was first in London. "Compared to what? You only need to be less shit than before and 5% less shit than the other guys". Laca is an upgrade on Welstroz so he meets the becoming less shit test. But does he help Arsenal become better than the other guys? I am not seeing it. I think all this can only work if a right sided forward worth 15 goals a season was signed or Iwobi becomes that guy Problem is Alexis is going to leave and take 20-30 goal per season potential with him.
Giroud has fallen off this season. He was always slow, but he could create a yard of space in the box. Now it looks like he can’t do that, even against Europa League teams.
Still does. Just doesn't do it because of bad squad construction. Giroud was linked with a bunch of moves, but Wenger pulled the plug on a sale because our depth chart was Lacazette, Welbeck, and then Walcott.