For all our possession

[Samwam27 519]

Whilst our defence is looking so much stronger this season, our conversion of shots to goals, with 60% possession for majority of games is a concern (yes we are top, yes we have only 2 out of 23 games)

To put it in contrast look at the HT stats at Leeds v Everton. Leeds 62% possession and yet 2-0 down. I've said it before in that possession doesn't count for anything if you aren't putting your chances away

Hopefully we'll come out of our sticky patch, but Pukki doesn't look as sharp this season, Buendia has supported with goals, then it starts drying up. I wonder where the goals are going to come from?

[Capt. Pants 4,195]

Godfrey with an assist I see.

[king canary 7,578]

Wenger coined the term 'sterile domination' a few years back which is a perfect description of our last couple of games.

[hogesar 9,618]

Possession vs shot conversion as a comparison? That's a new one..

[Dr Greenthumb 746]

1 hour ago, Samwam27 said:

Whilst our defence is looking so much stronger this season, our conversion of shots to goals, with 60% possession for majority of games is a concern (yes we are top, yes we have only 2 out of 23 games)

To put it in contrast look at the HT stats at Leeds v Everton. Leeds 62% possession and yet 2-0 down. I've said it before in that possession doesn't count for anything if you aren't putting your chances away

Hopefully we'll come out of our sticky patch, but Pukki doesn't look as sharp this season, Buendia has supported with goals, then it starts drying up. I wonder where the goals are going to come from?

The possession stats are high because Gibson, Hanley and Krul have an awful lot of the ball between them. I’m more interested in chances

[nutty nigel 7,509]

It's weird because we are top for possession but also top for shotspg. That could be Hanley, Gibson and Krul but I don't remember many🙃

[Branston Pickle 3,634]

Stats can be very misleading - playing  around in defence will obviously help push up possession but isn’t necessarily threatening; meanwhile shots don’t necessarily mean a lot - dribblers from the edge of the area are shots on target but are hardly a problem....and as for corners, we’ve scored from 1 in over a year so hardly worth it!

look at tonight in the PL:

Liverpool v Brighton  possession 64:36 shots 11:13 on target 1:4; score 0-1

Vila v West Ham possession 56:44 shots 9:20 on target 2:10; score 1-3

Leeds v Everton possession 63:37 shots 16:10 on target 7:6 score 1-2

The upshot is that it’s not the numbers that matter, but more so the quality of it/them - and even more obviously, the score.

[nutty nigel 7,509]

How about these stats...

Points won 

Games won 

Games unbeaten 

League position 

 

 

[Greavsy 2,412]

Stats can always be made to say a multitude of things. 

Anyone remember us beating Brighton 2 - 0 but not having any shots on target. Was a bizarre match. 

https://www.90min.com/posts/4903483-norwich-create-bizarre-stat-line-by-beating-brighton-2-0-without-a-single-shot-on-target

[Branston Pickle 3,634]

Precisely, Nutty.  Ultimately possession of 80% is worth nothing if you don’t score, same with shots.  Clearly there’s certain conclusions you can draw from stats eg if you have 65% possession that’s nearly 60 minutes out of the 90 which limits the opposition’s possession to 30.... but the game is much more about what you do with it.

Edited February 3, 2021 by Branston Pickle

[Samwam27 519]

15 hours ago, Branston Pickle said:

Precisely, Nutty.  Ultimately possession of 80% is worth nothing if you don’t score, same with shots.  Clearly there’s certain conclusions you can draw from stats eg if you have 65% possession that’s nearly 60 minutes out of the 90 which limits the opposition’s possession to 30.... but the game is much more about what you do with it.

I agree Branston. My point is (with the exception of us being top) we're consistently having very high possession %, but more recently other teams are notching up same number of shots on target as ourselves. Not much point if we have 60/70% possession but opponents are having same number of shots on target per game.

We're definitely more solid at the back than at any point over last two to three seasons, but more recently we're struggling to create chances and get them on target.

Does make me laugh for any team, considering the skills of players, it amazes me how often players "miss the target completely" when in good positions!