Chris Wilder said if there was a Blades swear box it would have been a lot fuller after half time at Norwich. And most people seemed to agree that United went out with extra vigour in the second half.

That resulted in two quick goals around the 50-minute mark, then we let Norwich have more of the ball in the second period but pressed them at opportune moments.

You can see the relative numbers of passes per 10 minute period here.

And here are just Sheffield United passes, with a very noticeable drop-off in the second 45.

Here’s where we pressed them in the top 3/5 of the pitch.

Here are some more charts for extra context.

team	Sheffield Utd	Norwich City
xG	0.605	1.090
shots	9	14
onTarget	3	4
touches	616	769
deepC	19	17
touchesInBox	23	26
passes	460	623
passSucc	0.685	0.767
ppda	7.16	7.67
directness	0.585	0.516
avgLine	47.8	46.7
shots6	NA	NA
shotsPen	6	8
shotsOutside	3	6

Preview: Norwich vs Blades, 8 Dec 2019

The starkest stat to start with for this match is the goal difference table. This tells the story of a Norwich team that outshoots the Blades by a little, with almost the same goals scored tally, but which allows lots of shots and lots of them converted.

Norwich goals for is 16 (Blades 17) while the Canaries goals against is more than double the Blades (32 vs 15).

That’s even more apparent when we look at shots against and goals against per game, where Norwich are among the worst in the PL. They’ve racked up a staggering 256 shots against so far.

That’s reflected in the expected goals/against tally too, which measures numbers and quality of shots taken and allowed. While the Blades keep shots against pretty much in line with their shots for, Norwich allow way more shots than they take.

Norwich are way less direct, and play much less high than United. That’s shown by their lower deep completions numbers as well as, obviously, their average line, portion of time spent in opponents’ final thirds, and directness numbers.

team	Norwich City	Sheffield Utd
P	15	15
F	16	17
A	32	15
xG	16.1	18.4
xGA	29.0	17.4
shots	173	158
shotsAgst	256	169
passesPG	494	445
passSuccPG	0.797	0.726
ppdaPG	12.00	9.14
deepCPG	11.3	23.5
touchesInBoxPG	23.2	19.9
avgLinePG	43.5	49.2
opp3rd	0.218	0.297
directnessPG	0.487	0.542

 

 

 

 

Sheffield United 0 vs Newcastle United 2, 5 Dec 2019

Well, I am today wearing a big pink caveat to atone for the over-confidence implicit in my pre-match blog post.

But I am satisfied that I called the shape of the game correctly. Newcastle demonstrated an almost bizarre unwillingness to press and a defensive depth that would have pleased WW2 Soviet generals*. As a result, some Blades numbers were Man City-like. More of that below.

What can we learn from this most disappointing of defeats? (I’m leaving VAR out of this, btw).

I think Wilder and Knill took the right approach to start — we’d outshot Newcastle by 8-to-1 with 5 on target by the start of the second half — but I think we paid the price for not having the tactics to winkle out a stubbornly dug-in opponent. More of that below too.

They made us look like Man City (except in one key stat)

Last night we broke a lot of records for the season so far. They were:

• Most touches (883)
• Most passes (758)
• Most deep completions (passes in final 20m) (34)
• Most touches in the opponent’s box (31)
• Most touches in the final third (285)
• Second highest average line (55.2m — against Leicester it was 56.2m)
• Least direct play (39% of pass distance was towards goal — Man City average 36%)

Tellingly, the one stat that wasn’t a record was shots (13). This was fewer than against Southampton, Palace and Tottenham and only one more than against Liverpool and Manchester Utd.

Here’s our passmap. You can see the areas of the pitch that Newcastle occupied in and around their box.

Here are our pass numbers, bucketed into 10-minute periods. There’s only one spell where Newcastle passed more than we did.

Here’s our average player position map. Only three United players average positions was in our own half. By contrast, only three Newcastle starting players average positions was in our half.

Newcastle’s remarkable aversion to pressing

This chart shows United’s passes in the top 3/5 of the pitch and Newcastle’s defensive actions in the same area. The lack of pressing is quite staggering and is a result of not spending much time in our half, and being very happy to allow us to come onto them.

This is the Blades pressing map, for a bit of contrast. At a PPDA (passes per defensive action) of 5.82, that’s a reflection of a diametrically opposed approach in which we aimed to retain the ball when we had it and get it back if we didn’t.

Did Wilder get it right?

Knowing that Newcastle would sit in, CW/AK went for a mostly familiar starting line-up, but with Billy and Oli up front. In Billy’s case in particular that seemed to be predicated on the likelihood we would play high and pass lots and get our chances without the need for masses of pace. It was going to be about grinding them down from lots of high possession.

And to a large extent it worked. By the second half we’d had enough chances and shots on target to justify being ahead, and it’s fair to say Newcastle’s keeper played a massive part in that.

So, I think pretty much we got the first stages of the game right.

Could we have changed things? In a way that made a difference?

I think we could. When Mousset came on he was effectivly asked to do the same as the forwards had been doing all night; to try and grind away at getting through a very crowded final third and heavily-fortified penalty area.

And lately we seem to have realised that that approach doesn’t work for us. So, we’ve adapted to use of more direct tactics, as I’ve outlined here.

This works for two reasons. Firstly, against top class opposition we’re likely to be pushed further back up the pitch than we were in the lower divisions. Secondly, against defences that are a cut above what we met in L1 and the Championship it simply doesn’t work to play high and try to fight our way into the box all the time.

Instead, we seem now to more often break from the middle, often using Mousse’s pace to create something in much more open territory. Last night that space wasn’t available, and I think what was lacking was the ability to pull Newcastle’s back 10 up the pitch to create it.

Now, I’m not surprised we can’t just select that tactical approach from the toolbox. It’s not something we have really come up against much in the PL and, well, it may not work anyway, especially when the opponent has a lead to protect.

But I can’t help thinking that a way of pulling opponents out of their trenches so we can use pace in space behind them is a thing we needed to try later in last night’s game.

team	Newcastle Utd	Sheffield Utd
xG	0.455	1.420
shots	6	13
onTarget	4	6
touches	446	883
deepC	17	34
touchesInBox	15	31
passes	285	758
passSucc	0.649	0.825
ppda	43.2	5.82
directness	0.693	0.390
avgLine	41.2	55.2
shots6	NA	1
shotsPen	3	9
shotsOutside	3	3

(* Military history reference. The Red Army was noted for defensive preparations that involved kilometre on kilometre of defensive lines made of trenches, anti-tank weapons, dug in infantry etc, such as at Kursk in 1943)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blades vs Newcastle. 5 Dec 2019

Poor at both ends
For the first time this season Sheffield United should, on paper, have too much for the opposition. Caveats based around, “This is the Premier League” and “It’s football; the ball is round” etc do apply, but Newcastle perform badly in some key areas and look like they’ve retreated into a safety-first mode of play.

The long and short of it is they don’t score many goals (four less than the Blades, who are not exactly free-scoring so far this season) and let a lot more in (22 against SUFC’s 13).

That is reflected in expected goals/against since the beginning of the season.

Player xG contributions
In terms of creating goal scoring chances we can look at both teams’ players contributions. And it is truly remarkable to see John Lundstram and David McGoldrick sitting high and right on the chart that measures xG and number of shots (below).

Ultra-cautious home and away
Formation-wise they tend to play 5-4-1 at home and away, although they have started with 4-4-2 a couple of times. They may go for  5-3-2 at Bramall Lane, however, as they did at Wolves.

Newcastle are a real outlier when it comes to pressing and average line held by their players. They appear to hardly press at all and rely heavily on counter attacking. They are the second most direct team in the league (behind Burnley).

Below is a passmap for their away win at West Ham. Remarkably, they got three goals from so few passes in West Ham’s final third.

It also goes to show they can be a threat — as can any team in this division — but the numbers don’t seem to indicate they are consistently dangerous.

Early season lessons?
If we look at their directness over time since the beginning of the season, we can see that Newcastle have settled into their current style. A couple of losses followed by a win against Spurs in August may well have convinced Bruce and his team that sitting deep and being very direct is the answer. We can’t know how intentional all this has been but it certainly is how they’v ended up playing.

There wouldn’t seem to be much of an option for Chris Wilder than to go for it early on against Newcastle. The more a goal against forces them to come forward the more we are likely to punish them.

But please don’t forget the caveats at the top of the page.

 

team	Newcastle Utd	Sheffield Utd
P	14	14
F	13	17
A	22	13
xG	13.5	17.0
xGA	25.9	16.9
shots	144	145
onTarget	50	49
shotsAgst	217	163
passesPG	337	422
passSuccPG	0.707	0.719
ppdaPG	19.96	9.49
deepCPG	10.2	22.8
touchesInBoxPG	14.6	19.1
avgLinePG	43.4	48.7
opp3rd	0.208	0.294
directnessPG	0.570	0.553

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

team	Wolverhampton	Sheffield Utd
xG	1.68	0.94
shots	13	9
onTarget	3	4
touches	715	578
deepC	17	21
touchesInBox	30	22
passes	570	398
passSucc	0.784	0.734
ppda	6.8	7.13
directness	0.400	0.556
avgLine	49.2	48.6
shots6	2	1
shotsPen	6	7
shotsOutside	5	1

 

Something is happening to Sheffield United’s way of playing.

The Blades are doing all things they’ve become known for over recent seasons, such as playing high in the opponent’s half, with the occasional appearance of marauding centre backs.

They’re also still doing all the things that lots of people didn’t necessarily notice too, like playing quite directly at times and being very resilient in defence.

What’s changed isn’t the components of Sheffield United’s style of play, but the mix of those parts.

As Chris Wilder and Alan Knill’s team have notched up their first dozen games in the Premier League the things we can measure seem to show that a learning experience, an adjustment, has taken place.

What we have – at 12 games in – is a team that is not able to reap the rewards of battering the opposition with lots of intricate passing play high up the pitch.

Instead, the emphasis is shifting to playing more in the middle of the park, being more direct from there, taking fewer preparatory passes in high areas and being more efficient with touches in the opponent’s box.

As things stand, that evolution has led to Blades being 5^th in the table (after the Spurs game), with 17 points from four wins, five draws and three defeats.

Before we look at the deeper numbers around those, let’s cast our minds back to last season. Although United had begun to evolve the tactical toolbox we’re now seeing by the second half of the Championship promotion season, this was a team still known for pinning opponents back and passing lots, high and on the flanks, before penetrating to the danger areas.

The first chart shows touches in the opponent’s box mapped against deep completions (passes in the final 20m of the pitch) for the 2018-19 Championship season.

Sheffield United’s ability to successfully play in that way against teams in that division is evident, with a large number of touches in the box and deep completions, with a bias towards the former (hence being above the average line).

The relatively low number of shots (indicated by the colour of the blob) is a result of discipline and efficiency in front of goal. The Blades of League One and the Championship seemed to have been coached to get the ball to the most dangerous high xG areas before loosing off a shot, ie the six-yard box. You could almost say it was a strategy built around a very effective striker for whom pace isn’t the highest number on his Match Attax card.

Now, compare that chart to the Blades measured on the same terms 12 games into this Premier League season. Compared to last season United are an outlier, with a well above average number of deep completions and a well below average number of touches in the opponent’s box.

If you think that looks bad, it’s actually a slight improvement on early November. Since then, the effects of what seems to be a shift in emphasis in the way we play has allowed United to shuffle left a bit.

Here’s what seems to be happening.

The Blades are evolving towards playing more directly from the middle of the pitch, with more rapid attacks and build-ups from those areas.

Here are some numbers that illustrate this.

Firstly, let’s look at directness and average line. Directness is increasing.

After four games United were 8^th in the PL in terms of directness, which is measured by dividing the distance travelled by passes towards the opponent’s goal by the total distance the ball moves.

Sheffield United are now third in that table, on 56%. The range goes from about 37% of pass distance being forward (Manchester City) to 61% (Newcastle).

At the same time, average line is decreasing. This is measured by averaging the position of all players’ touches during matches. Sure, it doesn’t account for off-the-ball positioning and relative amounts of possession, but as a proxy it gives an idea of how high a team has played.

Now let’s go back to deep completions and touches in the opponent’s box. We’ve contrasted last season and this season so far.

But let’s dig down and look at what’s happened this season in more detail.

It looks a lot like playing less high and making more rapid attacks from the middle of the park has gone hand-in-hand with an increase in the number of touches in the box, in absolute numbers and relative to deep completions.

Consequently, while per game average line and directness have diverged in the chart, deep completions and touches in box have converged, as seen here.

Why would there be a relationship between the two? If you spend more time in the middle of the pitch (average line declining) and rely more on rapid breaks or quick build-ups from there (directness increasing) then the volume of passes in the final third will decline while the number of touches in the box increases relatively.

The above chart is cumulative. That is, it adds up all these actions and averages them over games played, so it shows a trend. If we look at actual games played and the numbers of deep completions and touches in box we can see that the last six games have differed significantly from the first six.

In the first six games deep completions were way in excess of touches in the opponent’s box. On average United made nine more deep completions than they had touches in the box before the Liverpool game.

It’s all very well to have possession and to have it high up the pitch, but if it’s not effective, what’s the point?

That could well have been the conversation the Blades’ coaching staff had early on, because in the last six games that has changed.

In four of those six matches, touches in the box exceeded deep completions. That is directness illustrated. And even in games where there were more passes in the final 20m than touches in the box, it was by a small margin. In fact, the Blades averaged one more of the latter than the former per game in that period.

Further evidence comes when we look at final third entries and final third touches.

Between the first six and last six games final third entries averaged about the same, at roughly 50 per game. Meanwhile, however, final third touches declined from an average of 176 up to the Everton game to 158 since Liverpool at home.

All of which makes it look like several things have taken place.

The first few games were a learning experience. United tried to play the way they had played in the lower divisions and came up against very good and well-organised defences that were very happy to let us play around with it on the flanks all day long and then bat away anything that came in the box.

The Leicester game epitomised that, with United losing despite having the highest number of final third touches in the season so far.

If we had the chance to ask CW/AK their thoughts on that part of the season it’d be reasonable to ask, did they decide playing from deeper, with more rapid breaks and builds, was likely to be more fruitful than patient build-ups from high on the wings?

It’d also be reasonable to ask, when did that realisation hit home? It felt during the Liverpool game that United were very happy to try to keep play in the middle of the pitch and break from there, and it was a game we were unlucky to lose. Also, the week before at Everton the Blades had been pinned back for most of the game but won with two goals on the break.

Since then, Wilder has spoken about the importance of counters in the PL.

Not that United are becoming a purely counter-attacking team.

The performance at Spurs in the first 15 minutes, for example, and in the period leading up to the goal showed United are very capable of playing on the front foot high up the pitch, and from the off.

But, it looks like forward progress from the middle third is happening much more rapidly. It is also combined with the ability to press high and counter at times, to sit deep and sustain pressure at others, and all with rapid transitions between offensive and defensive dispositions in all parts of the pitch.

And at the level of things that are less easy to quantify, it also looks like United have shaken off the air of caution that marked the early parts of some matches in the new season (in the first half at Chelsea, for example).

It certainly looks like United are finding their feet in the PL in what’s shaping up to be a memorable season already.

Sheffield United’s pressing performance at Tottenham was the team’s second most intense of the season. The Blades carried out 50 defensive actions in the home side’s defensive 3/5 of the pitch. These include interceptions, challenges, tackles, blocked passes and ball recoveries.

Meanwhile Tottenham made 438 passes in the same part of the pitch, which gives Blades PPDA (opposition passes per defensive action) of 8.76. (Away at Bournemouth ranks higher  than this at 7.39).

Of the 50 defensive actions against Spurs in the top 3/5 of the pitch the busiest player was John Lundstram, with 12 defensive actions, followed by Oliver Norwood (9), Chris Basham (7) and Lys Mousset (5).

Interestingly, most of the Blades defensive actions in this area were on the right side of the pitch. Left-sided players Fleck and Stevens only chalked up 6 defensive actions between them.

Breaking those defensive actions/opposition passes down into 10-minute segments it is possible to see periods in which pressing was applied more than in others.

The Blades gained a better ratio of opposition passes per defensive action than Spurs in four of these 10-minute segments out of nine in total (10-20, 50-60, 60-70, 80-90).

The big caveat on all this is that the defensive actions recorded only give a shadow/proxy of what’s really happening. Pressing obviously includes a lot of actions off the ball, such as a player simply being in a passing lane, and I don’t have that data.

Spurs (1) vs Blades (1), 2 Nov 2019

Leaving aside the ludicrous VAR decision, this was a superb performance from Sheffield United, who could easily have walked away with three points.

United took the game to Spurs from the start, with what seemed like a conscious plan to force things from early on. No goals resulted from that period of pressure but it meant Tottenham didn’t get into their stride.

Spurs are clearly a side full of great quality and we were outshot, pot-possessed, out nearly everything, but it didn’t feel like it.

This was the Blades second most intense pressing performance of the season so far (PPDA of 8.76). Breaking that down into 10-minute segments it is possible to see periods in which pressing was applied more than in others. See that breakdown here in a separate blog post.

team	Tottenham	Sheffield Utd
xG	1.45	1.14
shots	17	14
onTarget	5	4
touches	803	586
deepC	16	15
touchesInBox	24	17
passes	648	420
passSucc	0.827	0.733
ppda	6.29	8.76
directness	0.416	0.555
avgLine	47.0	50.5
shots6	2	NA
shotsPen	5	8
shotsOutside	10	6

 

 

Pre-match stats preview. Blades at Tottenham. 9 Nov 2019

Tottenham’s fortunes in the PL season so far have been pretty awful by their standards. They sit 11th with three wins, four draws and four losses, while Sheffield United breathe the air in the heady heights of 6th place.

Spurs’ troubles can be spotted in a couple of graphics.

The first is expected goals (xG) and expected goals against (xGA). These measure the number and quality of shots and shots against, and in these charts you really want your pink line to be above your blue one.

While the Blades are achieving some comfort in this regard, largely due to fantastic out-of-possession play, Spurs xG and xGA are digressing wildly.

In short their defences are leaky and they just don’t create enough chances.

 

Drilling down a bit deeper into this. We can take a look at the xG contribution of Spurs and Blades players. In previewing many games so far this season, it’s been usual to see the opposition’s forwards stretching chart off way to the right and hardly a Blades player in the top right quadrant.

Obviously no disrespect to our players, but there haven’t been many of these graphs that looked like this so far this season. Yes, that’s right. David McGoldrick, Oli McBurnie and John Lundstram all with higher xG than Son Heung Min. Only Kane outdoes any Blades player.

Clearly they have a job scoring, and closing down the opposition too (165 shots against!). There’s no doubt they are a team full of quality, but something obviously isn’t clicking. Let’s hope tomorrow isn’t the day it does.

I think Blades fans can be quietly confident of bringing something back from the capital again.

team	Sheffield Utd	Tottenham
P	11	11
F	12	17
A	8	16
xG	13.5	11.1
xGA	12.8	17.3
shots	110	132
shotsAgst	122	165
passesPG	424	564
passSuccPG	0.719	0.805
ppdaPG	10.2	11.1
deepCPG	23.9	17.6
touchesInBoxPG	19.3	22.2
avgLinePG	48.3	46.7
opp3rd	0.290	0.251
directnessPG	0.552	0.445

An illustration below of justhow woeful Tottenham have been this season. This was their final third passmap against Watford (1-1 at home on 19 Oct) where they barely penetrated Watford’s danger areas.

 

 

 

Blades (3) vs Burnley (0), 2 Nov 2019
A great win that puts the Blades up to 6th in the PL.

In some ways we out-Burnleyed Burnley, coming out as more direct than them, and content to let them have more of the ball, make more passes etc.

But Sheffield United had many more shots and seemed to make the bulk of our chances from pressing, turnovers and rapid breaks out from the middle third.

It may be that the 90-minute stats mask some intense periods of pressing and more careful build-up play.

Our touches in the opponent’s box outweighed deep completions* for only the third time this season. Against West Ham and Liverpool were the other times this happened.

(* Deep completions are passes in the final ~20m of the pitch)

team	Sheffield Utd	Burnley
xG	1.59	0.74
shots	13	6
onTarget	0.38	0.83
passes	426	514
passSucc	0.67	0.73
deepC	23	18
touchesInBox	27	13
avgLine	48	47
directness	0.60	0.54
ppda	11.3	7.3
shots6	1	NA
shotsPen	11	5
shotsOutside	1	1
touches	555	629