Analytics at Everton

[Louis]

Article at Sports Illustrated from an English US-based journalist who spent some time at Finch Farm with Steve Brown, head of Performance Analytics at Everton.

 

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/writers/jen_chang/04/29/performance.analytics/index.html

[Hafnia]

http://www.prozonesports.com/news-article-everton-fc-choose-prozone-recruiter.html

 

yep, a lad I know plays footy with James Smith - Moyes is all over the detail - admirable but does anyone think you can get paralysis by analysis?

[Steve_E]

Good thing. Go with the times. I saw this piece on telly once about Louis van Gaal, apparently he's a stats freak too.

[Hafnia]

I think that may be the reason why Moyes seems to never have a Plan B - spend hours to set a team up to understand how certain players do things, but good players adapt, improvise, use counter measures to overcome the player that has their move sussed.

 

We are probably the victim of this type of analysis, you have hardly ever have had to be a student of the game to see that we are very one dimensional - work to the corner flag and look for Cahill for example.

 

I like sometimes the "go out there and express yourself"

[pete0]

 

I like sometimes the "go out there and express yourself"

You need to find the right balance, Moyes does seem to be on the extreme though. I'd like us to try go through the middle more, it's harder but we have the players to do it. Moyes seems to play percentage football, always going down the left.

[Hafnia]

You need to find the right balance, Moyes does seem to be on the extreme though. I'd like us to try go through the middle more, it's harder but we have the players to do it. Moyes seems to play percentage football, always going down the left.

 

I bet he had a break down when Baines got injured

[pete0]

I bet he had a break down when Baines got injured

Nar, he probs had a wank because he won't have to drop Jags any more.

[Steve_E]

Are we really going to turn analysing our game play in detail and providing our players with detailed information about opponents and themselves into a bad thing?

[pete0]

As long as they still use the vids and it's only used as a compliment to show the stats, such as how often they cut in from a certain angle ect. It's no big advancement really, just gives a broader set of data as obviously Moyes and the players cant watch every game.

[Matt]

http://www.eplindex.com/14562/everton-201112-good-bad-opta-stats-analysis.html

 

Interesting reading there

[tonyh]

This is the most significant bit for me, in terms of our failings:

 

One alarming facet of Everton’s game was their lack of penetrating through-balls. Steven Pienaar’s return drastically improved this, for before his arrival, there had been times when only Stoke City had achieved fewer through-balls than Everton. With Pienaar on board orchestrating things, the Toffees’ rose to eighth worst, yet a sobering fact is that Alex Song (with 24) still made more successful through-balls than the entire Everton squad put together (21). This is certainly an area that must be addressed this off-season.

[Matt]

merged (made sense to put it here and keep things tidy)

[pete0]

This is the most significant bit for me, in terms of our failings:

 

One alarming facet of Everton’s game was their lack of penetrating through-balls. Steven Pienaar’s return drastically improved this, for before his arrival, there had been times when only Stoke City had achieved fewer through-balls than Everton. With Pienaar on board orchestrating things, the Toffees’ rose to eighth worst, yet a sobering fact is that Alex Song (with 24) still made more successful through-balls than the entire Everton squad put together (21). This is certainly an area that must be addressed this off-season.

Think Jelavic being upfront rather than Saha being on the half way line was the main reason. Once again an example of Pienaar getting rimmed when Osman has the better stat 4/8, much better than 3/12. Maybe if we acknowledged him the papers and England would.

[GoodisonRoad]

 

Think Jelavic being upfront rather than Saha being on the half way line was the main reason. Once again an example of Pienaar getting rimmed when Osman has the better stat 4/8, much better than 3/12. Maybe if we acknowledged him the papers and England would.

Admit it... Pienaar slept with ya misses didn't he!? Where was Osman up until jan? C'mon Pete Pienaar made a massive impact on the whole team. Osman has been better as a result of him coming back. What do you have against him?

[pete0]

Admit it... Pienaar slept with ya misses didn't he!? Where was Osman up until jan? C'mon Pete Pienaar made a massive impact on the whole team. Osman has been better as a result of him coming back. What do you have against him?

He's performed for half a season and gets all the credit, when we done exactly the same last year once he left. I expect this off Liverpool fans not Evertonian's. The bit they took actually had Osman getting praised and they cut the quote because they need to give Pienaar some god-like persona to make up for his short-comings.

If you look at the stats Pienaars are very similar to Drenthes.

Edited May 17, 2012 by pete0

[GoodisonRoad]

Here you go with all these bloody stats again! (I know this is an Analytics thread) you were moaning about him coming back throwing all these stats around and he came back and you yourself said a couple of days a go you were "impressed" with how he had played since coming back! so if Moyes had listened to all those stats, we wouldnt have had him back and we wouldnt even be close to 7th, lets be honest. i dont think anything will ever change your mind about pienaar, so i'll leave it. But i do agree with you that Osman doesnt get any where near the recognition that he deserves.

 

Also say's in that, that Heitinga made the most fouls.... does that make him a bad defender?

Edited May 17, 2012 by GoodisonRoad

[pete0]

Here you go with all these bloody stats again! (I know this is an Analytics thread) you were moaning about him coming back throwing all these stats around and he came back and you yourself said a couple of days a go you were "impressed" with how he had played since coming back! so if Moyes had listened to all those stats, we wouldnt have had him back and we wouldnt even be close to 7th, lets be honest. i dont think anything will ever change your mind about pienaar, so i'll leave it. But i do agree with you that Osman doesnt get any where near the recognition that he deserves.

 

Also say's in that, that Heitinga made the most fouls.... does that make him a bad defender?

We were wank till he left last year, what makes you think we wouldnt of done the same this year?

Bad example, Heits had the lowest amount of goals conceded, less than 1 per game.

[Louis]

That journalist has just been appointed as head of communications at Liverpool. So it looks like the promised followup piece will never happen,

[Matt]

We were wank till he left last year, what makes you think we wouldnt of done the same this year?

Bad example, Heits had the lowest amount of goals conceded, less than 1 per game.

which goes to show that beating the crap out of the opposition is an effective technique

[Steve_E]

http://theexecutionersbong.wordpress.com/2012/05/16/201112-statistical-tactical-deconstruction/

[pete0]

http://theexecutione...deconstruction/

Quick summary for anyone too lazy to click.

Main stat that sticks out for me is on average we lose 10 games a season, this year we'd lost 9 in the first half alone. And some stats are hard to believe 'Jags is ranked 10th in the top flight for most accurate long balls per game (6.6) with a 57% accuracy.'

Leon Osman is vital for us, only winning 20% of games w/o him, opposed to 46% with him.

'When Fellaini has started in the midfield – forward pivot role we have scored 2.3 goals per game with the Belgian scoring or assisting 5 goals in the process in these games alone.'

Team of the seaon

Howard

Hibbert Heitinga Distin Baines

Osman Neville Gibson Pienaar

Felliani

Jelavic

Edited May 26, 2012 by pete0