[Albion] xG - we're down to 12th

[Jim in the West]

Apologies if this has appeared elsewhere, and I know we're focussed on POINTS this season, rather than last season's favourite metric, xG. However, good to see that we're still above Palace. Obviously way to early to read too much into this, as (like the proper league table) it depends very much who you've played. But the likes of Newcastle, Norwich, Watford, Burnley are where you'd expect them. The surprise is probably Leicester - interesting that they seem to be conceding some big chances.

 

[Giraffe]

Excellent news.

I reckon it's more a reflection of the type of teams we have played so far though rather than a change in style.

 

[Nobby Cybergoat]

Our weekend opponents second bottom

 

[Moshe Gariani]

Having spent all of last season banging on about the usefulness of xG in quantifying what could easily be seen watching the Albion (i.e. "luck" plays a part in football and especially if your strikers lack a bit of confidence) then I'm not going to abandon it now.

Too early to read much into the table though.

We can play better than we have done so far?
Leicester have had a couple of hard fixtures and not played great in the other two...?

Very early days.

 

[Perkino]

So we are outscoring our xg of 4.3 with 5 goals and bettering our xga of 4.4 having only conceded 3. No doubt it's because we didn't sign a striker

 

[Gabbafella]

So we're now putting away chances we're not creating as opposed to not putting away chances we were creating?
Makes perfect sense.

 

[nickbrighton]

So we're now putting away chances we're not creating as opposed to not putting away chances we were creating?
Makes perfect sense.

that makes as much sense as this whole xG malarkey , biggest case of Emperors new clothes in football. Some shots are harder than others, some will go in, some will not. some difficult chances will be scored, some simple tap ins will be missed. Wow, who would ever have thought it.

There are simply too many variables ranging from something as measurable as distance and angle, to something as immeasurable as a gust of wind at the wrong time, and a slippery bit of grass or a flash of sun light in the keepers eyes as a cloud moves out the way.

Its trying to put a certain mathematical value to a subjective idea and that simply doesnt work.

 

[Justice]

I’m with Maupay on this one, when asked about xG his comment ‘ bullshit ‘

 

[el punal]

Where does Wadworths 6X fit in in all of this?

 

[Guinness Boy]

Down with this meaningless statistic and all its hipster slaves.

 

[bn1&bn3 Albion]

Potter OUT!

 

[nwgull]

I don’t understand why people get so wound up by the existence of xG. It’s just another stat, and sports fans love stats, don’t they? For someone that’s not been able to see a game live, it’s far more indicative of the dominance of a team than stats like percentage possession or simple shots at goal, and it gives a good idea of whether or not the strikers and keeper have been clinical or played a blinder respectively.

The basis for its calculation is solid and done on a huge amount of historical data from thousands of games and takes into account the variables of each chance created.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

that makes as much sense as this whole xG malarkey , biggest case of Emperors new clothes in football. Some shots are harder than others, some will go in, some will not. some difficult chances will be scored, some simple tap ins will be missed. Wow, who would ever have thought it.

There are simply too many variables ranging from something as measurable as distance and angle, to something as immeasurable as a gust of wind at the wrong time, and a slippery bit of grass or a flash of sun light in the keepers eyes as a cloud moves out the way.

Its trying to put a certain mathematical value to a subjective idea and that simply doesnt work.

I agree. Having invented a few scoring systems and methods of sifting difference in my research area, there are easy ways of taking small differences and exaggerating them for purposes of propaganda. That table above is predictive of **** all. If Leicester are the second worst achieving side in the EPL, in the great scheme of things, I am Das reich's love puppet, and Mouldy Boots' flagellator.

 

[Gabbafella]

I agree. Having invented a few scoring systems and methods of sifting difference in my research area, there are easy ways of taking small differences and exaggerating them for purposes of propaganda. That table above is predictive of **** all. If Leicester are the second worst achieving side in the EPL, in the great scheme of things, I am Das reich's love puppet, and Mouldy Boots' flagellator.

I love it when you talk dirty.

 

[warmleyseagull]

Dont get all the anti. In the Xg table for 20/21 Albion qualify for Europe and Palace are relegated. What's not to like?

 

[Audax]

I agree. Having invented a few scoring systems and methods of sifting difference in my research area, there are easy ways of taking small differences and exaggerating them for purposes of propaganda. That table above is predictive of **** all. If Leicester are the second worst achieving side in the EPL, in the great scheme of things, I am Das reich's love puppet, and Mouldy Boots' flagellator.

xG isn't meant to be predictive.

Which is where so many go wrong with it; they think it's predictive.

 

[nwgull]

xG isn't meant to be predictive.

Which is where so many go wrong with it; they think it's predictive.

Correct. It highlights specific weaknesses in a team. A great example is from last season when our actual goals conceded were significantly in excess of our xG conceded for the first dozen games. This indicated that the defence was actually doing a decent job but that the keeper, Matt Ryan at this point, was below par. Sanchez was then promoted to first-choice keeper after the 12th game (0-3 v Leicester). We won't know how much Potter's decision was based on the xG stats, but the fact is that our xG conceded from this point on more or less matched the actual goals conceded. Most significantly, we were on 10 points in 12 games at that point (0.833 points per game) and ended up with a further 31 points from the next 26 (1.19 points per game), from a simple swap in one position!

 

[Moshe Gariani]

xG isn't meant to be predictive.

Which is where so many go wrong with it; they think it's predictive.

Is this "not meant to be predictive" thing a rather sophisticated issue?

For me, xG provides something I'm quite interested in as an Albion fan which is a comparative measure of the overall quality of our defensive and attacking play across a series of matches. This seems to be a bit like the "form" of a racehorse (i.e. in some way predictive of likely future performance).

Obviously, the more data you have then the better the prediction. Last season's final xG table, combined with transfer influences, could be used to help predict this season's performance. I predict Brighton will finish higher in the league table than we did last season.

 

[Audax]

Is this "not meant to be predictive" thing a rather sophisticated issue?

For me, xG provides something I'm quite interested in as an Albion fan which is a comparative measure of the overall quality of our defensive and attacking play across a series of matches. This seems to be a bit like the "form" of a racehorse (i.e. in some way predictive of likely future performance).

Obviously, the more data you have then the better the prediction. Last season's final xG table, combined with transfer influences, could be used to help predict this season's performance. I predict Brighton will finish higher in the league table than we did last season.

Yeah, it's a fair bit more nuanced than what I made it look. The reality is that it can be used as part of a toolkit to try to predict what happens in the future on the basis of what happened in the past. But it is only that - one part of an overall kit of tools for making the prediction. In and of itself, it is a metric that looks at historic events and gives some information about those historic events. Nothing more, nothing less. The predictive value lies only in how a human interprets the data.

So I guess the more accurate statement would be:

xG isn't *designed* to be predictive. But smart people can use it as a data point to help make educated guesses about what might happen in future matches.

Also, there's a massive caveat: as with all statistical metrics like this, the more data you have the more useful it becomes. With only 4 matches into the season, it's not going to be very useful - not enough data points as yet to smooth out the "luck" results (so for both us and Leicester, our numbers are clearly affected at the moment by just a couple of goals that have gone in where statistically they were more likely to not go in). Personally, I won't pay much attention to xG stats for this season until we're at least 10 games into the season.

 

[Moshe Gariani]

Correct. It highlights specific weaknesses in a team. A great example is from last season when our actual goals conceded were significantly in excess of our xG conceded for the first dozen games. This indicated that the defence was actually doing a decent job but that the keeper, Matt Ryan at this point, was below par. Sanchez was promoted to first-choice keeper after the 12th game (0-3 v Leicester). We won't know how much Potter's decision was based on the xG stats, but the fact is that our xG conceded from this point on more or less matched the actual goals conceded. Most significantly, we were on 10 points in 12 games at that point (0.833 points per game) and ended up with a further 31 points from the next 26 (1.19 points per game), from a simple swap in one position!

I understand and agree with this.

Albion xG stats for first 12 games told us that a more effective goalkeeper was a priority and could be used to predict better results were well within reach of the current team performances.