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"Not accounting for dumb/bad luck" or the fluctuations of players' mindset or form throughout a game is what makes it flawed...
and, dare I say it, misses half the point of why we love football.... It ISNT perfect, mistakes are. Made, and THAT'S the beauty of it... You CAN'T, nor should you be able to predict it...

It's trying to take guesswork, opinion and surprise out of the game altogether...

Xg is just a glorified video game stat generator....
Players aren't machines...

Had it been around back then, Xg wouldn't have accounted for Gerrard's slip v Chelsea, or Mendes' dissallowed goal at Old Trafford... Or Trippiers' o.g v Chelsea...
or countless other slips, brainfarts and gaffes down the years that have won or lost titles, let alone games!

At best, it's an after the event 'Woulda Coulda Shoulda' gaming app that becomes infuriating when you look back at 'what you COULD have won!

Bloody X-Box gaming generation ruining REAL football!

Football is the game it is because of ALL ITS IMPERFECTIONS!

Are people still boring on about Xg?

I bet these 10 goals had an Xg below 1


All it means is someone had the ball in a good position to score from.
 
"Not accounting for dumb/bad luck" or the fluctuations of players' mindset or form throughout a game is what makes it flawed...
and, dare I say it, misses half the point of why we love football.... It ISNT perfect, mistakes are. Made, and THAT'S the beauty of it... You CAN'T, nor should you be able to predict it...

It's trying to take guesswork, opinion and surprise out of the game altogether...

Xg is just a glorified video game stat generator....
Players aren't machines...

Had it been around back then, Xg wouldn't have accounted for Gerrard's slip v Chelsea, or Mendes' dissallowed goal at Old Trafford... Or Trippiers' o.g v Chelsea...
or countless other slips, brainfarts and gaffes down the years that have won or lost titles, let alone games!

At best, it's an after the event 'Woulda Coulda Shoulda' gaming app that becomes infuriating when you look back at 'what you COULD have won!

Bloody X-Box gaming generation ruining REAL football!

Football is the game it is because of ALL ITS IMPERFECTIONS!
But if you are consistently underperforming on your xG then you can see you are playing well and that if you upgrade your attackers, you will win more games. Similarly if you are over performing on your xG it shows your overall game is not so good but your strikers are saving your ass. So the team needs to work on creating more chances instead. Its a stat that does provide a little bit of insight on what areas of your game are working and what is not.

Sure there is the 'eye test' but your eyes dont remember everything over the whole season.

My problem with xG is that I dont know the exact criterias and how much subjectivity is used.
 
But if you are consistently underperforming on your xG then you can see you are playing well and that if you upgrade your attackers, you will win more games. Similarly if you are over performing on your xG it shows your overall game is not so good but your strikers are saving your ass. So the team needs to work on creating more chances instead. Its a stat that does provide a little bit of insight on what areas of your game are working and what is not.

Sure there is the 'eye test' but your eyes dont remember everything over the whole season.

My problem with xG is that I dont know the exact criterias and how much subjectivity is used.

It's literally a zone based marking system. In the box, outside the box, between the posts, outside the posts, defender to beat, no defender to beat etc. The closer to goal you are with the least number of defender to beat the higher the Xg.
It doesn't consider who the player is - you'd bet your mortgage on Kane tucking a big Xg away. Moura? Nope, probably fall over the ball.
And per my video, you can have a player who can score from 20 yards easily and regularly, but those chances are low in Xg terms. No matter how good and consistent a player is at it.
 
People bang on about Brighton - their Xg is 37.2 - they have scored 28.
There are quite a few teams below them in the league with a higher Xg. There is nothing special about the way Brighton play, they're not "almost a good team" They are where they belong - bottom half.
 
It's literally a zone based marking system. In the box, outside the box, between the posts, outside the posts, defender to beat, no defender to beat etc. The closer to goal you are with the least number of defender to beat the higher the Xg.
It doesn't consider who the player is - you'd bet your mortgage on Kane tucking a big Xg away. Moura? Nope, probably fall over the ball.
And per my video, you can have a player who can score from 20 yards easily and regularly, but those chances are low in Xg terms. No matter how good and consistent a player is at it.
Another thing is, I might be wrong but i dont think xG takes into account when shots are not taken. So if a cross just goes past the strikers toe and he didnt get a touch to tap it in , it doesnt count that as a chance as no shot was taken. In reality if you try that over and over again, you'd get a lot more goals than other types of chances.
 
Another thing is, I might be wrong but i dont think xG takes into account when shots are not taken. So if a cross just goes past the strikers toe and he didnt get a touch to tap it in , it doesnt count that as a chance as no shot was taken. In reality if you try that over and over again, you'd get a lot more goals than other types of chances.

Probably. So many stats are flawed to the point they're utterly useless.
All that really matters is goals for, goals against and points really.
 
I think you are missing the point of it and over exaggerating it's use ... Its just an extra statistic to be used alongside shots/shots on target which is more accurate as it actually takes into account the quality of those chances. Shots have been recorded and compared long before the X-box generation!
Are people still boring on about Xg?

I bet these 10 goals had an Xg below 1


All it means is someone had the ball in a good position to score from.

But if you are consistently underperforming on your xG then you can see you are playing well and that if you upgrade your attackers, you will win more games. Similarly if you are over performing on your xG it shows your overall game is not so good but your strikers are saving your ass. So the team needs to work on creating more chances instead. Its a stat that does provide a little bit of insight on what areas of your game are working and what is not.

Sure there is the 'eye test' but your eyes dont remember everything over the whole season.

My problem with xG is that I dont know the exact criterias and how much subjectivity is used.

I see....

I do get the points people are trying to make...

I think my main problem is it's trying to make things even more clinical, in a game that is already being over-conplicated...

Then again, I still can't get my head around a shot that goes in off the post or bar is counted as technically "off target" ...you try doing it!
It's why the crossbar challenge is SO hard!

I suppose the crux of things like Xg (and the complexities and drawn lines of VAR) is that it's turning the "simple game for the working man" into a meticulously over scrutinised Amusement Arcade game for rich tourists.... And I'm not sure I like that!

I'm just bitter they introduced Goal Line technology AFTER Pedro Mendes' GOAL at OT!!
 
I see....

I do get the points people are trying to make...

I think my main problem is it's trying to make things even more clinical, in a game that is already being over-conplicated...

Then again, I still can't get my head around a shot that goes in off the post or bar is counted as technically "off target" ...you try doing it!
It's why the crossbar challenge is SO hard!

I suppose the crux of things like Xg (and the complexities and drawn lines of VAR) is that it's turning the "simple game for the working man" into a meticulously over scrutinised Amusement Arcade game for rich tourists.... And I'm not sure I like that!

I'm just bitter they introduced Goal Line technology AFTER Pedro Mendes' GOAL at OT!!

not to mention hitting the woodwork and not scoring is not a shot on target, but passing to a keeper is.
 
I see....

I do get the points people are trying to make...

I think my main problem is it's trying to make things even more clinical, in a game that is already being over-conplicated...

Then again, I still can't get my head around a shot that goes in off the post or bar is counted as technically "off target" ...you try doing it!
It's why the crossbar challenge is SO hard!

I suppose the crux of things like Xg (and the complexities and drawn lines of VAR) is that it's turning the "simple game for the working man" into a meticulously over scrutinised Amusement Arcade game for rich tourists.... And I'm not sure I like that!

I'm just bitter they introduced Goal Line technology AFTER Pedro Mendes' GOAL at OT!!
I see what you are trying to say too. But Im sure stats do serve a purpose. If a manager has his whole team setup perfectly but needs a clinical finisher, he would look for someone who is outperforming his xg( as in getting more goals than the average striker would get from similar chances) rather than just someone who has scored a lot of goals but is missing a shedload of big chances too.

stats = rich tourists thing made me laugh though.
 
Understat has an xg of 0,98 for Spurs in this game. Pretty ridiculous. Son's first goal has an xg of 0.07, which means he scores once in 14 attempts. Kulusevski's goal's xg is 0,08 which could be pretty accurate. He was well defended and the angle was poor. Just a great shot. Son's second goal has an xg of 0.38. This was the best chance in the game according to Understat. 1/3 chance of scoring is probably pretty accurate. Son's third goal has an xg of 0.12 which means he only scores once in eight attempts. That's just stupid.
 
"Not accounting for dumb/bad luck" or the fluctuations of players' mindset or form throughout a game is what makes it flawed...
and, dare I say it, misses half the point of why we love football.... It ISNT perfect, mistakes are. Made, and THAT'S the beauty of it... You CAN'T, nor should you be able to predict it...

It's trying to take guesswork, opinion and surprise out of the game altogether...

Xg is just a glorified video game stat generator....
Players aren't machines...

Had it been around back then, Xg wouldn't have accounted for Gerrard's slip v Chelsea, or Mendes' dissallowed goal at Old Trafford... Or Trippiers' o.g v Chelsea...
or countless other slips, brainfarts and gaffes down the years that have won or lost titles, let alone games!

At best, it's an after the event 'Woulda Coulda Shoulda' gaming app that becomes infuriating when you look back at 'what you COULD have won!

Bloody X-Box gaming generation ruining REAL football!

Football is the game it is because of ALL ITS IMPERFECTIONS!
Thank you
When BC came on here and started spouting all this statistical cobblers I tried to put that point across, that any statistical analysis fails to take into consideration the fact that the game is played by humans - who if you repeat any given situation 10 times they will make different choices based on a myriad of conditions that go beyond situational, like form, emotions, breathing, visual acuity, sound etc etc
All things that number crunching can never do.

The fact is, he doesn't get it.

Sport is not a science, and no amount of trying to package it to fit in to games console behaviours is ever going to make made up cobblers like xG relevant or meaningful.
 
Whenever xG comes up there will always be a group of people who tell you it is totally meaningless despite the fact EVERY TOP FOOTBALL CLUB will utilise xG in some way or another. Tuchel, Klopp, Guardiola and numerous other elite managers have talked about it before, all of these clubs spent lots of money on statistical analysis and xG is a part of that.

Is it the be all to end all? No. It's just a way of measuring something. God knows why people get so uppity about it because it's new(ish).
 
It's definitely not rudimentary. It's one of the more complex and interesting statistical measurements that uses hundreds of thousands of "events" to model probability, and of course it's not perfect, it can't go the final step and account for "dumb luck" or "bad luck" or the mood/form/quality of the guy taking the shot or the guy trying to save it but it's pretty reliable indicator of not just quantity but quality of chance being created.

To back up it's viability just look at a league table calculated using XP (Expected points) calculated from XG/XGA in games and it pretty much reflects the traditional league table.

Nearly all top half teams slightly out perform their X/G and XGA (against) and nearly all bottom half underperform it, suggesting that better quality players make a difference.

The xg's from yesterday's games were almost identical, theirs accrued from probably double the events ours did. XG rated the biggest chance of the game Son's 2nd when clean through (0.48 xg).
Its not rudimentary, and then lists several decisive factors that aren’t / can’t be considered. I don’t doubt the depth of the data, it’s the variety of it that makes it’s usefulness questionable at best to me.

Which leaves the argument with, we’ll it’s definitely accurate because xG - xGA ~ League table. Well we’ve had league tables since the birth of association football. Why do we need another way of telling us that the teams at the top of the table are creating more and scoring more chances than they are conceding than the teams below them? It brings nothing new to the party as far as I’m concerned.

A whole industry has been invented and the only discernible outcome I can see is it’s sucking money out of the game.
 
It's definitely not rudimentary. It's one of the more complex and interesting statistical measurements that uses hundreds of thousands of "events" to model probability, and of course it's not perfect, it can't go the final step and account for "dumb luck" or "bad luck" or the mood/form/quality of the guy taking the shot or the guy trying to save it but it's pretty reliable indicator of not just quantity but quality of chance being created.

To back up it's viability just look at a league table calculated using XP (Expected points) calculated from XG/XGA in games and it pretty much reflects the traditional league table.

Nearly all top half teams slightly out perform their X/G and XGA (against) and nearly all bottom half underperform it, suggesting that better quality players make a difference.

The xg's from yesterday's games were almost identical, theirs accrued from probably double the events ours did. XG rated the biggest chance of the game Son's 2nd when clean through (0.48 xg).
Its OK but misses a lot of factors. For example sonnys first is counted as a weak foot chance despite the fact he doesn't really have a weak foot.

Kulsevskis goal at City was a low xg chance because the model doesn't take into account the position of the goalkeeper which is mental.

I think its overused but is a decent metric in terms of judging medium-long term trends
 
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