Lies, lies, damn lies and statistics

[seriouslyred]

Dealing with your last point first jonkool there will always be outliers and we should remember that this is based upon the volume and quality of chances, not quality of finishing. One might hope that CAFC would be an outlier but one wouldn't put money on that outcome!

For sure we can look at individual games but if we take the eRatings literally then we can say that we are just 0.1 of a goal per game outside of the top six on expected goals created and that will hopefully be addressed by Mavididi, Fosu and others arriving. In fact the top four sides are on 1.6 xG so expect to score two goals a game more often than not - perhaps that is where we need to be?

On the defensive side our xG conceded is still 1.4 as it was last season and that is almost 1/3 of a goal higher than our competitors. One interpretation of that stat is to state that we could still achieve sixth place without addressing that, but we are not going to progress very far against our direct competitors. Two ways forward might be to address the number of chances conceded perhaps or to raise our attacking game even higher to say an xG of 1.7 or even 1.8 per game. An overall xG of 0.3 or 0.4 indicates a team at the right level.

Incidentally, the xG for yesterday was 2.9:1.5 so it is possible to pursue success with free flowing football! Peterborough, Scunthorpe, Rotherham and Shrewsbury presented similar stats yesterday even though they didn't all win. Obviously one game cannot be used to judge especially when there might be up to 30 chances on goal at both ends with just three or four goals. In other words goals are random events! But perhaps a month could be taken as a reliable sample?

If Experimental 361 releases the xG eRatings towards the end of February we can see for ourselves whether the changes in the squad this window deliver the theoretical uplift required.

[jonkool]

Thanks for the response Red and points made are valid.

Away from the statistical analysis, we potentially have an exciting 3 months or so to look forward to with some interesting away trips within a reasonable radius including Pompey, Dons x 2, Northampton and Posh!

[canterburyaddick]

Jan 21, 2018 21:36:01 GMT jonkool said:

Thanks for the response Red and points made are valid.

Away from the statistical analysis, we potentially have an exciting 3 months or so to look forward to with some interesting away trips within a reasonable radius including Pompey, Dons x 2, Northampton and Posh!

I'm a bit of a Luddite regarding football stats, to be honest, preferring the unpredictable nature of the beautiful game. However on a more important note, do you fancy meeting up before the Pompey game for a pint or two? As I explained on Saturday, we are off there for the weekend.

[jonkool]

Jan 21, 2018 22:42:30 GMT canterburyaddick said:

Jan 21, 2018 21:36:01 GMT jonkool said:

Thanks for the response Red and points made are valid.

Away from the statistical analysis, we potentially have an exciting 3 months or so to look forward to with some interesting away trips within a reasonable radius including Pompey, Dons x 2, Northampton and Posh!

I'm a bit of a Luddite regarding football stats, to be honest, preferring the unpredictable nature of the beautiful game. However on a more important note, do you fancy meeting up before the Pompey game for a pint or two? As I explained on Saturday, we are off there for the weekend.

Absolutely Cants! I trust that you will be able to recommend a suitable venue that offers a food option too

[Mundell]

For seriouslyred and anyone else who might be interested you’ll find below a link to Experimental’s updated Eratings. 

We rank an unimpressive tenth in the table, but with points in hand over three of the sides with a better expected goal difference we are rated as the seventh most likely side to finish in the top six. Experimental’s analysis suggests we have just less than a forty percent chance of making the playoffs. 

At the risk of stating the obvious, what this means is that if we continue to play as we have so far this season then we are 3/2 against making the top six. However, with the players at his disposal Karl Robinson ought to be looking to improve on those odds. 

Odds on a playoff place

[seriouslyred]

Feb 4, 2018 16:31:55 GMT Mundell said:

For seriouslyred and anyone else who might be interested you’ll find below a link to Experimental’s updated Eratings. 

We rank an unimpressive tenth in the table, but with points in hand over three of the sides with a better expected goal difference we are rated as the seventh most likely side to finish in the top six. Experimental’s analysis suggests we have just less than a forty percent chance of making the playoffs. 

At the risk of stating the obvious, what this means is that if we continue to play as we have so far this season then we are 3/2 against making the top six. However, with the players at his disposal Karl Robinson ought to be looking to improve on those odds. 

Odds on a playoff place

Our 40% chance of making the top six has not changed materially over the last two weeks despite the loss yesterday and not playing last week. Why? Bradford are in freefall while Peterborough and Portsmouths results have not been good, else they would have taken some if not most of our 40% chances. And Rotherham's chances of making the top six have climbed to 80%.

We are tenth in expected goal difference but not much different to Peterborough in 7th on +0.06 and Oldham in 16th on -0.06. In short that is why they invented the play-off system all those years ago so as to keep the season alive for teams like us! This and three points for a win makes it all to play for! We could examine why we only have an average xG: injuries to defenders, no 20 goal a season striker or perhaps poor game management?

As you say, it's now down to what KR can do with the squad plus the possible return of some better centre backs. We are still in the running as far as the bookies are concerned. When they give up, so will I - but not before! The game vs Bradford in a couple of weeks is the one which could push our chances above 50% - at their expense. Or virtually kill the season?

[reamsofverse]

We will NOT reach the play-offs, it's as simple as that.

[Mundell]

The run in

Thought it might be interesting to update my post above. Our remaining fixtures are as follows, ranked in League table order with Experimental’s Xg rating in brackets, i.e. Shrewsbury are second in the table with the ninth best ‘expected goal difference’.

Home (7)

2. Shrewsbury (9)

3. Blackburn (2)

4. Scunthorpe (6)

5. Rotherham (3)

6. Bradford (4)

10. Plymouth (21)

17. Fleetwood (17)

Away (9)

2. Shrewsbury (9)

8. Portsmouth (5)

9. Peterborough (7)

11. Bristol Rovers (8)

18. Northampton (24)

19. Blackpool (13)

20. AFC Wimbledon (14)

22. MK Dons (20)

23 Rochdale (11)

That’s certainly not an easy sequence of fixtures. We’ve got five of the top six sides at home along with in form Plymouth who’ve just beaten Blackburn and Shrewsbury. Away from home we have five of our nine remaining fixtures against sides who are in the relegation dogfight. Moreover, three of those, Blackpool, AFC Wimbledon and Rochdale, have expected goal differences which suggest they are somewhat better than their league table position implies.

Perhaps the good news is that Bradford City, currently in sixth place, are ‘on target’ for only 70.4 points and while it’s always possible that a team from the chasing pack, including Portsmouth, Peterborough, or even Plymouth, could put a ‘run’ together it might be that as few as 71/72 points will be enough to secure sixth place in the table. For us that’s twenty five points from our remaining sixteen games.

That certainly won’t be easy given the matches we have left to play, but it’s far from being over yet. However, our next two matches, at home against Bradford and away at MK Dons, are two of our least difficult fixtures and if we don’t do well in these games our hopes will begin to slip away.

[Mundell]

Sat on the train this morning, thinking about tonight’s match against Bradford City, the first of five home games against teams in the top six, I wondered how we’d fared so far against the better teams in the League.

My intuition was that we’d not done very well, but I was nevertheless surprised by the result. We’ve already played six home matches against the other sides in the top thirteen in the table, with six to play. We’ve won just one of those matches (against Bristol Rovers on the opening day), drew one (the late, late show against Peterborough) and lost four.

That 1-1-4 record is in sharp contrast to our results against teams in the bottom half which is 7-3-0. Unfortunately, we have just one of those games left, against Fleetwood Town.

The pattern away from home is similar, but less stark. On our travels against the top group we are 2-2-4 with impressive wins at Rotherham and Bradford. We have four to play against sides in this group. Against the rest we are 3-2-1 with five games to play, all of which are against teams deep in relegation territory.

Combining our results home and away, our record against the better teams is a disappointing 3-3-8. Fortunately, we’ve been very consistent against teams in the bottom half of the table with an excellent 10-5-1 record.

This stark contrast in our results against teams currently in the top and bottom halves of the table explains a lot. We appear to be a decent side, but lack the cutting edge and defensive resilience needed when we play the better sides. That will almost certainly need to change if we are going to grab one of the playoff places and even more so if we manage to get there.

[Deleted]

Be good to have Pearce back then and get the new boys firing on all cylinders... All to play for...

[Mundell]

I agree with that.

[seriouslyred]

Feb 13, 2018 7:16:12 GMT Mundell said:

Sat on the train this morning, thinking about tonight’s match against Bradford City, the first of five home games against teams in the top six, I wondered how we’d fared so far against the better teams in the League.

My intuition was that we’d not done very well, but I was nevertheless surprised by the result. We’ve already played six home matches against the other sides in the top thirteen in the table, with six to play. We’ve won just one of those matches (against Bristol Rovers on the opening day), drew one (the late, late show against Peterborough) and lost four.

That 1-1-4 record is in sharp contrast to our results against teams in the bottom half which is 7-3-0. Unfortunately, we have just one of those games left, against Fleetwood Town.

The pattern away from home is similar, but less stark. On our travels against the top group we are 2-2-4 with impressive wins at Rotherham and Bradford. We have four to play against sides in this group. Against the rest we are 3-2-1 with five games to play, all of which are against teams deep in relegation territory.

Combining our results home and away, our record against the better teams is a disappointing 3-3-8. Fortunately, we’ve been very consistent against teams in the bottom half of the table with an excellent 10-5-1 record.

This stark contrast in our results against teams currently in the top and bottom halves of the table explains a lot. We appear to be a decent side, but lack the cutting edge and defensive resilience needed when we play the better sides. That will almost certainly need to change if we are going to grab one of the playoff places and even more so if we manage to get there.

In defence of KR one can say that we have won 17 of our last 35 league matches even if we feel that should have been 18 or 19 after the last couple of games. However almost all of those 17 wins were against lower half sides as you suggest. What can be stated is that our poor run in November and December against top ten sides coincided with injuries to key players such as Fosu and Pearce. In fact Fosu transformed our fortunes providing goals and chances even when Magennis wasn't doing so well.
Speaking of Magennis he is certainly a player who doesn't fare so well against the better sides - better defenders perhaps or less service?

Bottom line is that we need Pearce back and Sarr at least on the bench. And then for KR to play the right front six as well as bringing on the right subs. We have a half decent squad - probably the most competitive in a long while. Tons of flare for the three behind Magennis but no natural goalscorer.

Verdict: we will make the the play-offs but then found out as not good enough against better opposition. That's a forecast but is based upon the stats which we agree upon.

[jonkool]

Feb 13, 2018 11:01:13 GMT seriouslyred said:

Feb 13, 2018 7:16:12 GMT Mundell said:

Sat on the train this morning, thinking about tonight’s match against Bradford City, the first of five home games against teams in the top six, I wondered how we’d fared so far against the better teams in the League.

My intuition was that we’d not done very well, but I was nevertheless surprised by the result. We’ve already played six home matches against the other sides in the top thirteen in the table, with six to play. We’ve won just one of those matches (against Bristol Rovers on the opening day), drew one (the late, late show against Peterborough) and lost four.

That 1-1-4 record is in sharp contrast to our results against teams in the bottom half which is 7-3-0. Unfortunately, we have just one of those games left, against Fleetwood Town.

The pattern away from home is similar, but less stark. On our travels against the top group we are 2-2-4 with impressive wins at Rotherham and Bradford. We have four to play against sides in this group. Against the rest we are 3-2-1 with five games to play, all of which are against teams deep in relegation territory.

Combining our results home and away, our record against the better teams is a disappointing 3-3-8. Fortunately, we’ve been very consistent against teams in the bottom half of the table with an excellent 10-5-1 record.

This stark contrast in our results against teams currently in the top and bottom halves of the table explains a lot. We appear to be a decent side, but lack the cutting edge and defensive resilience needed when we play the better sides. That will almost certainly need to change if we are going to grab one of the playoff places and even more so if we manage to get there.

In defence of KR one can say that we have won 17 of our last 35 league matches even if we feel that should have been 18 or 19 after the last couple of games. However almost all of those 17 wins were against lower half sides as you suggest. What can be stated is that our poor run in November and December against top ten sides coincided with injuries to key players such as Fosu and Pearce. In fact Fosu transformed our fortunes providing goals and chances even when Magennis wasn't doing so well.
Speaking of Magennis he is certainly a player who doesn't fare so well against the better sides - better defenders perhaps or less service?

Bottom line is that we need Pearce back and Sarr at least on the bench. And then for KR to play the right front six as well as bringing on the right subs. We have a half decent squad - probably the most competitive in a long while. Tons of flare for the three behind Magennis but no natural goalscorer.

Verdict: we will make the the play-offs but then found out as not good enough against better opposition. That's a forecast but is based upon the stats which we agree upon.

Your 'verdict' is difficult to argue against given the stats.

Luck does come into it and keeping the squad injury free makes a huge difference. Having Pearce, Bauer Konsa and Saar available will help tighten up the defence. Also having one of the two new loanees available up front with Maginnes operating out wide where he has been most effective for Norn Ireland would help to boost the stats in the last3 months of the season.

[Mundell]

The timelines for yesterday's League One fixtures can be found here. Nothing we don't already know. Shrewsbury won comfortably. We created nothing after a bright opening. Always reassuring when analysis like this is so clearly fits with intuition.

The latest E Ratings update from Experimental 3-6-1, along with a new set of probabilities for the top two, the playoffs and relegation, is somewhat less intuitive though and is linked here.

Experimental reckons we still have a 40% chance of a playoff place. That's a bit surprising though we're 11/10 to make the playoffs with Skybet which is largely consistent.

The explanation is probably broadly as follows. It's very clear that four clubs Blackburn, Rotherham, Shrewsbury and Wigan are a cut above the rest so that two playoff places are already taken, with Scunthorpre highly likely to bag the third. The pack is way off the pace, or at least that's the interpretation, with Charlton being seen as the most likely of the stragglers to crawl over the line.

Implicit in this must be a view that Plymouth's recent form is not likely to be sustainable. We'll see. If it is they'll make the top six with the length of the home straight to spare. At the same time, Bradford, Portsmouth and Peterborough are fighting for breath and struggling to stay in the race. 

Our difficult run in suggests to me that we won't make it. However, it's possible that 70 points, or even fewer, might be enough to sneak into sixth place this time and that remains an attainable total. For that scenario to play out though we need Plymouth to tire and fade. 

Hard to be positive after yesterday, but there is still hope.   

[Mundell]

Feb 11, 2018 11:05:23 GMT Mundell said:

The run in

Our remaining fixtures are as follows, ranked in League table order with Experimental’s Xg rating in brackets, i.e. Blackburn are first in the table with the third best ‘expected goal difference’.

Home (5)

1. Blackburn (3)

4. Rotherham (2)

5. Scunthorpe (5)

6. Plymouth (18)

20. Fleetwood (21)

Away (8)

2. Shrewsbury (12)

9. Portsmouth (4)

10. Peterborough (8)

12. Bristol Rovers (7)

16. Blackpool (10)

18. AFC Wimbledon (15)

19. Northampton (24)

24. Rochdale (9)

I've edited the table above to show our remaining fixtures in the same format as before, but with the League position and E Ratings of our opponents updated. Our run in doesn't look any easier. 

[seriouslyred]

I've borrowed this from @lardiman to show why we are 40:60 with the bookies and Experimental 3-6-1 and why I believe the fans are positive after two terrible seasons. It doesn't include yesterday and sets the play-off bar a tad low at 72 points. It clearly shows that we have been on the edge of the play-offs for some time now and that we are nine points better than this time last season.

The open question is whether we can secure the 24 points to reach sixth at the end of the season. That would be seven wins and three draws - same as last week but one less game to do it!


Table 1: Points gained compared to targets for Automatic Promotion / Play - off places / Avoiding relegation[/font]

---

---

[Mundell]

There is no way we’re going to get 24 points from our remaining 13 games. That’s seriously ridiculous!! :-)

If we need that many we’ll miss out. The hope is there because we may only need 18 or 19 points.

[seriouslyred]

Feb 25, 2018 15:00:09 GMT Mundell said:

There is no way we’re going to get 24 points from our remaining 13 games. That’s seriously ridiculous!! :-)

If we need that many we’ll miss out. The hope is there because we may only need 18 or 19 points.

As you state, we play Plymouth and Scunthorpe during the run-in. These have become must win games for they are our clear rivals. The only reason we are still at 40% is because Bradford are "gone" plus Portsmouth and Peterborough have not done very well of late. And we have to play them too!

Whatever the target, many will back the team and the manager whilst we still have chances. And those chances, plus the crowd yesterday demonstrate that we still have a thriving club on our hands.

[stonemuse]

Feb 25, 2018 15:47:57 GMT seriouslyred said:

Feb 25, 2018 15:00:09 GMT Mundell said:

There is no way we’re going to get 24 points from our remaining 13 games. That’s seriously ridiculous!! :-)

If we need that many we’ll miss out. The hope is there because we may only need 18 or 19 points.

As you state, we play Plymouth and Scunthorpe during the run-in. These have become must win games for they are our clear rivals. The only reason we are still at 40% is because Bradford are "gone" plus Portsmouth and Peterborough have not done very well of late. And we have to play them too!

Whatever the target, many will back the team and the manager whilst we still have chances. And those chances, plus the crowd yesterday demonstrate that we still have a thriving club on our hands.

I think thriving is a bit of a push. The word denotes that something is flourishing and prosperous - we most certainly are not.

We certainly have potential but, in view of what is happening around the club at the moment, I would describe it as embryonic.

[seriouslyred]

Feb 25, 2018 15:54:33 GMT stonemuse said:

Feb 25, 2018 15:47:57 GMT seriouslyred said:

As you state, we play Plymouth and Scunthorpe during the run-in. These have become must win games for they are our clear rivals. The only reason we are still at 40% is because Bradford are "gone" plus Portsmouth and Peterborough have not done very well of late. And we have to play them too!

Whatever the target, many will back the team and the manager whilst we still have chances. And those chances, plus the crowd yesterday demonstrate that we still have a thriving club on our hands.

I think thriving is a bit of a push. The word denotes that something is flourishing and prosperous - we most certainly are not.

We certainly have potential but, in view of what is happening around the club at the moment, I would describe it as embryonic.

Embryonic - sure. 2018 looks like the second year of a recovery from a train wreck. Nobody can argue that we have a better points tally than last season and that we had a big gate yesterday - lies, damn lies and statistics! The question is where next?

My suggestion is that if we stay in the blue zone (or near) then crowds will be good. And if next season we are on the fringe of the blue zone and the green automatic then crowds will continue to grow. Nothing to do with who the owner is and whatever goes on in the back office.

[Mundell]

I’ve started so I’ll finish, to coin a phrase, despite a considerable lack of enthusiasm, so I’ve provided a link below to Experimental 3-6-1’s E Ratings. It’s all very predictable and somewhat depressing. 

We are now ranked 11th in the table with an ‘expected goal difference’ which is essentially zero. In other words, we are bang average and there is a bigger gap between us and Blackburn, Wigan and Rotherham than between us and the bottom four. 

Experimental estimates that that we still have just less than a twenty five percent chance of making the playoffs, but we’re now equally likely to finish ‘solid’ mid table. We appear to have made little, if any, progress from last season. An underwhelming performance by Karl Robinson. 

Experimental 3-6-1’s E Ratings

[seriouslyred]

Mundell as you state Experimental shows a 25% chance of making the play-offs which is down from 40% in February. On the one hand that's progress compared to last season where we had a 10% chance at the end of January 2017 which then vapourised.
But, as you state, our expected goals is bang average and we simply cannot perform against top 10 sides. So our chances on the model might improve after the next two games? But after that we meet the likes of Plymouth and other top sides, they will slip again.

It's clear that the model looks at the season as a whole rather than taking account of more recent form. Hence Plymouth's chances are not high. However, whatever the perceived errors, it still offers a very good graphic showing likely outcomes. One might map the development against the mood on message boards and it wouldn't be a surprise to find some correlation?

Similarly, the bookies have dropped us from evens to make the top six down to 2:1. Time will tell how the next five games evolve. We've all seen Mavididi and Dasilva - if they both return before the end of March that might change the odds?

Other than that it looks like our chances will drift further downwards. That's a real shame given the last couple of seasons. For their has been potential to say that we had taken a clear step forwards. At least we had real hope for much of the season - that makes a change!

[overthetop]

Progress from last season
Progress from last season
Progress from last season
Progress from last season......

Give this mantra a rest ffs.

Last season was the worst ever in our history, anything has to be progress from that.

If all you're satisfied with is progress from last season, you're life must be a massive disappointment.

[Mundell]

Mar 12, 2018 9:25:15 GMT seriouslyred said:

Mundell as you state Experimental shows a 25% chance of making the play-offs which is down from 40% in February. On the one hand that's progress compared to last season where we had a 10% chance at the end of January 2017 which then vapourised.
But, as you state, our expected goals is bang average and we simply cannot perform against top 10 sides. So our chances on the model might improve after the next two games? But after that we meet the likes of Plymouth and other top sides, they will slip again.

It's clear that the model looks at the season as a whole rather than taking account of more recent form. Hence Plymouth's chances are not high. However, whatever the perceived errors, it still offers a very good graphic showing likely outcomes. One might map the development against the mood on message boards and it wouldn't be a surprise to find some correlation?

Similarly, the bookies have dropped us from evens to make the top six down to 2:1. Time will tell how the next five games evolve. We've all seen Mavididi and Dasilva - if they both return before the end of March that might change the odds?

Other than that it looks like our chances will drift further downwards. That's a real shame given the last couple of seasons. For their has been potential to say that we had taken a clear step forwards. At least we had real hope for much of the season - that makes a change!

We’ve had hope this season, and arguably still do to some extent, simply because we made a very good start. However, the data I’ve been reporting on this thread suggested that this ‘form’ wasn’t sustainable, i.e. that we’d been lucky.

How right that analysis has been, unfortunately. Truth is we’re little, if any, better than we were last season and that’s not only disappointing it’s a shocking indictment of Karl Robinson’s management. He’s had the players, and the time, to do much better.

[jonkool]

Mar 12, 2018 10:56:19 GMT Mundell said:

Mar 12, 2018 9:25:15 GMT seriouslyred said:

Mundell as you state Experimental shows a 25% chance of making the play-offs which is down from 40% in February. On the one hand that's progress compared to last season where we had a 10% chance at the end of January 2017 which then vapourised.
But, as you state, our expected goals is bang average and we simply cannot perform against top 10 sides. So our chances on the model might improve after the next two games? But after that we meet the likes of Plymouth and other top sides, they will slip again.

It's clear that the model looks at the season as a whole rather than taking account of more recent form. Hence Plymouth's chances are not high. However, whatever the perceived errors, it still offers a very good graphic showing likely outcomes. One might map the development against the mood on message boards and it wouldn't be a surprise to find some correlation?

Similarly, the bookies have dropped us from evens to make the top six down to 2:1. Time will tell how the next five games evolve. We've all seen Mavididi and Dasilva - if they both return before the end of March that might change the odds?

Other than that it looks like our chances will drift further downwards. That's a real shame given the last couple of seasons. For their has been potential to say that we had taken a clear step forwards. At least we had real hope for much of the season - that makes a change!

We’ve had hope this season, and arguably still do to some extent, simply because we made a very good start. However, the data I’ve been reporting on this thread suggested that this ‘form’ wasn’t sustainable, i.e. that we’d been lucky.

How right that analysis has been, unfortunately. Truth is we’re little, if any, better than we were last season and that’s not only disappointing it’s a shocking indictment of Karl Robinson’s management. He’s had the players, and the time, to do much better.

I think the ‘form wasn’t sustainable’ comment could be rewritten ‘bullied by top 10 - flat track bullies against the rest’. The form depends on when we had a top 10 concentration of fixtures.

[Mundell]

Yesterday’s timelines can be found here. Much more encouraging. 

[jonkool]

Mar 12, 2018 20:10:29 GMT jonkool said:

Mar 12, 2018 10:56:19 GMT Mundell said:

We’ve had hope this season, and arguably still do to some extent, simply because we made a very good start. However, the data I’ve been reporting on this thread suggested that this ‘form’ wasn’t sustainable, i.e. that we’d been lucky.

How right that analysis has been, unfortunately. Truth is we’re little, if any, better than we were last season and that’s not only disappointing it’s a shocking indictment of Karl Robinson’s management. He’s had the players, and the time, to do much better.

I think the ‘form wasn’t sustainable’ comment could be rewritten ‘bullied by top 10 - flat track bullies against the rest’. The form depends on when we had a top 10 concentration of fixtures.

Tough guy, no nonsense gaffer - perhaps the bullies are going to get their just deserts

[seriouslyred]

Mar 25, 2018 10:56:36 GMT Mundell said:

Yesterday’s timelines can be found here. Much more encouraging. 

They are indeed, as was the game itself. As posted elsewhere, we contaned them from 37 minutes on which is a big difference to that which we saw under KR. We will see over the next game or two whether we can maintain this pattern. If the answer is yes then perhaps time to venture down to the bookies?!

[seriouslyred]

experimental361.com/2018/03/26/e-ratings-update-league-1-26-mar-2018/

The latest eratings show two things.

First we are bang average and could easily move to eighth best on expected goals if the defence stays as tight as the Plymouth game. Just two decent performances could move us up a few places.

Secondly, our chances of making the top six are back up to around 25% after dipping to 15%. Our rivals play each other over the weekend so our prospects could perhaps go back up to 40%. Conversely they can go back down again.

Something about the table at 5pm on Monday! More significantly the performances with the xG as a proxy may well determine the mood of the fans in the final month. For we will have Dasilva and Mavididi back in a month - those two can make a real difference and are returning at just the right time.

[Mundell]

Yesterday’s League One timelines from Experimental 3-6-1 can be found here. The data confirms that it was a dominant performance, probably the best of the season so far, albeit against a side that’s clearly struggling.

Even during our start to the season, which saw us take 34 points from 17 games, analysis of our ‘expected goals’ suggested that we were never very convincing, but we now appear to be transformed under Lee Bowyer. I’m tempted to conclude that the reason is simply that we’ve got some very good players who are now being given the freedom to express themselves, playing in a system which suits them.

Football is a simple game. What was Karl Robinson doing to make it so complicated?