I collected the data on the percentage of matches in which a team scored first, to put it in correlation with the points made by that team during the same season. The chart shown below is about the English Premier League in the period 2009-2014. The correlation of course is pretty high, around 0,88. At this link you can find a larger and interactive version of the chart.
What did you do about scoreless draws? If a club scored first 20 times and played 3 scoreless draws, should you do 20/38 or 20/35? One way to handle scoreless draws would be to calculate how many time the club scored first - how many times their opponent scored first. The hypothetical club would then have 20 - 15 = 5.
The answer is 20/38: I treated the scoreless draws as matches where the opponent scored first. I did the calculation that you suggested, you can see the result in the first chart below. Of course the outcome is very similar to the previous one, but it could be interesting because in the y axis there are both positive and negative scores (the latter for the teams that scored first less times than their opponents). The problem is that, since it doesn't make much sense to calculate percentages here, I cannot make comparisons between leagues with different number of teams. Therefore, I decided to use the % of the "first to score" matches without the 0-0 draws (20/35 in your example). The outcome is in the chart below. The overall correlation is 0,8706, slightly less than the 0,8816 I had calculated before. At this link there is the updated version of the interactive chart.
You could transform the data like this: Scored first in every game: 1 Differential of 0: 0.5 Opponent scored first in every game: 0 Other values would be distributed proportionally and clubs that play in leagues with different number of games could be compared. In the EPL, a club's value would be (their differential + 38)/76. For the Bundesliga it would be (their differential + 34)/68.
Ok now I understand, but this means that at the end of the season a team would have a score ranging from zero to 1. And in the formula (differential+38)/76 I should use the differential (from 0 to 38), so I don't get why I should have two different scores for the same club (one from zero to one, and the other from zero to 38). Maybe I could give 1 point for a match where the team score first, 0.5 points for a 0-0 draw and zero points for the other matches.
Well done for taking the time to do this. Probably important to remember that the big teams (more often than not) will win whether they score first or not, but they often do get the first goal simply because they have the better squad. But if you're the underdog trying to cause an upset, or simply one of two teams on a level playing field, you can argue the first goal is imperative. How often do you see Chelsea or City lose from winning positions to lesser opposition? I think also it depends what type of team you are. If you're a team based around pace and intensity then the first goal can be crucial as it can act as a catalyst in gaining momentum to blow away the opposition and take the game away from them in the early stages e.g. Liverpool last season. However if you're a team who likes to keep things tight or are a team who is unable to capitalise on the momentum the first goal can have the opposite effect by spurring on the opposition e.g. Burnley vs Chelsea this season.
To add to this, take into account the importance of the first goal to counter attack teams. How often did we see Chelsea struggle last season when teams placed 8 men behind the ball, not committing enough men forward for them to effectively counter and grab an early first goal?
Yes George, my "study" is simplistic, it doesn't consider how the points are made. To an extreme, it could happen that a team lose all the games in which they score first, and win the matches where the opponent score first. As you said, there are many factors that could be taken into account (the difference of strength between the two teams, the type of football they play, and so on). I don't want to see if the best teams normally score first, because this is quite usual. My curiosity is always to compare the different leagues, to see if there are some leagues where, generally speaking, scoring first gives more points. EvanJ helped me to find a solution to compare the leagues, and when I will have a bit of time I will collect the data for the other main European leagues to see if something interesting emerges (I have no idea ). Thank you both.
At the moment I have completed only the EPL, with the system stated before: 1 point for a match where a team scored first, 0,5 points for a match ended 0-0, and then (score+38)/76. The result is shown below, with the complete and interactive version of the chart here. The correlation coefficient for the 5 seasons is 0,8722. I will update this thread when I will have collected the data from the other leagues.
These are the correlations for the top 6 European leagues in the last 5 years: They are almost all in the same range (0,80-0,93), with few exceptions. The most remarkable is the German 2010-2011 season, with a correlation of only 0,6621. In that season there were some teams that had very different results between the "First to score efficiency" and the number of points made. In particular: - Mainz scored first in only 13 matches (out of 34), but ended 5th in the league: they won 7 games after that the opponent scored first. - Three teams won less than 50% of the matches they scored first in: Hoffenheim won 8 out of 20, Wolfsburg 8 out of 17, Moenchengladbach 9 out of 19. All these three teams had an efficiency score around 0.80 (quite high), but ended respectively at the 11th, 15th and 16th place in the table. The highest correlation overall (0,9605) is the one of Barcelona in 2009/2010, when they had an efficiency score of 35 (out of 38), scoring 99 points. The lowest (0,60833) is the one of last season's Paços de Ferreira: they had an efficiency score of only 6.5 (out of 30), scoring 24 points. The longest streak belongs to, again, 2009-2010's Barcelona, with a series of 14 matches where they scored first (from the 8th to the 21st matchday). Counting also the 0-0 draws, the streak stretches to 21 matches (from 1st to 21st) without conceding the first goal to the opponent.
It is very important to score first for this reason. Not to take the pressure off your team. But, to put the pressure on their team. The opponent even in the beginning of the game will push more players into their attack. That makes it easier to counter attack them, and go from 1-0 to 2-0. Most coaches think or at least want to think they can hold a 1-0 lead. The truth is they cant especially if your playing a good team. But get the 1-0 lead and if your team havs a well practiced counter attack game a quick strike game. You can suprise them with another quick goal. Then if you have an organized defense. Your in business my friends then your even more likely to score again. The more impatient they are the better a counter works. Well what if your team gets behind? It is all about player confidence in his team. They have to really believe they are only five or six passes away of drawing level in the game . Even in the last minutes of a game. Thats a team that can win championships. How is that for a statistic you bean counters
Since nicklaino has coached, likely, 10 times longer than I have (literally) I do agree with him. Not that the stat is meaningless, but to me, as a coach, we coach humans and this speaks to the psychological strength of all players. Probably underscores the importance, not of scoring first but having players that are mentally strong and emotionally resilient. Manchester United under Ferguson never believed they were out of a game and their results showed it. Hard to quantify mental toughness. I do have to point out, nick, that despite calling them out for being "bean counters" you cite things based on popular FIFA statistics—most goals are scored in 7 passes or less and that most goals, in the men's game, is scored in the last five minutes of each half.
I keep a lot of statistics. I keep things like how many bad shots not on goal taken if your supposed to be a scorer how many shots on goal did you take. What was your scoring percentage on shots on goal. How many good crosses did you take when players are well positioned to actually put them in. I don't want to see crosses made like a machine with no one around to put them in. I want to see a flank player hold the ball and make the cross when team mates are there to put them in. Can a player cross the ball right on the receivers head when there is no first defender on him? Can we get the ball to a player with no first defender on him when we over load a side. How many corner kicks did we get. Mainly because when we get a lot of them. That means we are putting the opponents team under a lot of attacking pressure. More then just scoring opportunities. I don't consider a secondary assist a real assist. A assist that leads to another pass that leads to a goal? Come on it is a bogus satistic in my eyes. I want players to think an assist a pass that leads to a goal are as good as actually scoring a goal. Why, because if we said that goals are more important that passing. We would get even less goals. I think a back saving a goal from being scored is equal to a player scoring a goal. Things like that Does keeping statistic like the ones I mentioned other then goals, assists, saves have to be perfect. No close though it's to give me an impression on how the game went for us. One satistic that I want to be perfect is what player scored against us in a game, and how he scored against us. Why, because I never want him to score against us again in general and in the same way specificly.
I find this stuff interesting. Their is a place for the data and correlations for both coaches but more so especially to find a betting angle that might give you an edge from a purely mathematical pov. The OP should try finding some different betting markets and running through some of his different correlations just to see if you are onto something over the different leagues and seasons. You never know Then there is the other type of game statistics like Nick has posted above that have their own place
Yes, I am a bean counter. And no, this thread is not meant to give some fancy statistic or psychological insight into the way a coach could make his team gain more victories. It is only for fun I like these beans so much that I even created a chart about them You find the larger and interactive version here.
I checked which are the most efficient teams in winning games after they scored the first goal. In the tables below there are the top 10 (considering the same 6 leagues as above) for the last and the current season. The FTS/total field indicates how many times the team scored first on the total of the matches played (only in the domestic league). The percentage is simply the ratio between these two numbers. The W D L fields shows how the matches ended for that team, and the avg pts are the average points made by the team on those matches. For the ranking to be more consistent, I considered only the teams that scored the first goal in at least half of the games played. You can see that in this season there are 4 teams that always won the matches which they scored first in. I did the same thing for the teams whose opponent scored first, to see which are the best teams in coming back after having conceded the first goal of the match. The fields are as above, with the difference that here are considered the matches which the opponent scored first in.
I computed the final stats for the last season (2014/2015). As in the previous posts, I consider two kinds of "efficiencies"regarding scoring first: 1) how good is a team in scoring first, compared to the total number of matches; I used the system suggested by EvanJ: 1 point for a match which a team scored first in, and 0,5 points for a match ended 0-0; then I apply the formula (score + n of matches) / (n of matches * 2); for example, for EPL teams it is (score + 38) / 76; the final score, which I call coefficient, is between 0,5 and 1; 2) how good are the teams in keeping the lead after they scored first: I just counted the average points made by a team in the matches which they scored first in. I consider only the teams who scored the first goal in at least half of the games played, and only in the 6 main European Leagues. In a few days I will publish the complete rankings, for the moment I just write here the best teams. Best teams in scoring first: 1) Porto (Portugal) with a coefficient of 0,941 (in 34 matches, they scored first 29 times and twice they ended 0-0) 2) Barcelona (Spain) with a coefficient of 0,908 (in 38 matches, they scored first 30 times and twice they ended 0-0) 3) Benfica (Portugal) with a coefficient of 0,897 (in 34 matches, they scored first 26 times and twice they ended 0-0) Best teams in keeping the lead after they scored first: 1) Barcelona (Spain) 2,767 avg points (27 Wins, 2 Draw and 1 Loss) 2) Sevilla (Spain) 2,727 avg points (19 W, 3 D) 3) Porto (Portugal) 2,724 avg points (25 W, 4 D) I also got a final score, which is given by the multiplication of the two scores above. The top three teams in the last season were: 1) Porto (Portugal) with a score of 2,564 (0,941 * 2,724) 2) Barcelona (Spain) with a score of 2,512 (0,908 * 2,767) 3) Benfica (Portugal) with a score of 2,415 (0,897 * 2,692)
This is the complete ranking for the 2014/2015 season: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11Ww-B2SSfJ2ht_-19hhboxD81Z1hm75jjugNyJ0dTHI/edit?usp=sharing