Research
Research essays on football, data, and the things that connect them, updated rarely. New writing is in the Footnotes. RSS
The Rampart
Clearances, aerials, long balls, height. Five seasons of Premier League data, 1,778 matches. The league is building a wall.
Set Pieces
The Enclosure
Take-on success has fallen from 51.8% to 37.9% in four seasons. The common is enclosed.
The Stink
Fixed positions, rehearsed timing, collective over individual. The structural return of the dead ball goal.
The Wonder
Forty-two thousand corners. The engineering underneath the set piece revolution, pipe by pipe.
Shorter pieces
- When managers trust the kids: U21 substitutions by game state
Across 25,100 Premier League tactical substitutions since 2015/16, a one-goal lead is the hardest state for an under-21 player to get off the bench, unless they are an attacker and the team is losing.
Availability Is the Best Ability
Across six European leagues and ten seasons, injury burden predicts league performance. But the first injury is more expensive than it looks.
The Price of the Premier League
The Premier League generates more prediction market volume than Major League Baseball. What the prices tell you, and what they hide.
The Comfortable Save
A third of outside-box shots that reach the goal go to its middle, where keepers save 96–98% of them. A visual guide to the goal mouth's hidden geography.
The Harrying
Weather, distance, latitude. Twelve seasons of Premier League data, 4,451 matches. Why the north is the hardest place in England to come and win. And the one winter it didn't matter.