Analytic Review of 2020/21 - Part 3: The Nunolution
Welcome to the third part of the Wolves Analytics Review of the season.
Given the so-called N̶u̶n̶o̶l̶u̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ N̶u̶n̶o̶v̶o̶l̶u̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ change in style for 2020/21, I thought I’d take a look at exactly what changed.
So, we know that, compared to previous seasons, we took fewer shots from inferior locations. And gave up a relatively similar amount of shots but conceded more goals.
The transfers last summer were designed to evolve us into a team who used the ball better, so it seems sensible to start here.
So, straight up, we had marginally more possession throughout the last season. In fact, our possession numbers have improved each season (46.8% v 48.1% v 49.3%).
But, what are we doing with that ball? Well, we play with the ball slightly more in the defensive and middle thirds of the pitch but didn’t get the ball in the final third any more than in previous seasons.
We can see this further when we look at the types of passes we have made. Fewer passes into the penalty area, fewer progressive passes (essentially passes that move the ball at least 10 yards forward), and fewer switches of play. Our passes leading to a shot and passes into the final third were both up on last year, but as the passes into the penalty were down, that suggests passes leading to shots from poor positions (as detailed in Part 2). Unsurprisingly, we did throw more crosses into the penalty area, but these were not always successful.
Our ability to dribble and carry the ball forward was important. We increased our number of carries into the final third; at 14.3 per match, this was the sixth highest in the league. We were slightly down on our ability to carry the ball into the penalty area. Pedro Neto and Nélson Semedo had better-combined numbers (2.2 CPA) than Diogo Jota and Matt Doherty (1.9 in 2019/20). But this is an area where Raúl Jiménez was missed - only nine Premier League players ran the ball into the penalty area more in 2019/20.
One thing to note - our ability to attack is obviously a function of how the opposition defend. Despite having the ball more, we were pressed less by the opposition, who presumably were very happy to let us move the ball around in the defensive and middle thirds, knowing that we would not hurt them,
It wasn’t just the opposition who pressed less; we noticeably dropped our pressing and tackling in the middle-third.
This is perhaps a little surprising for a team attempting to play on the front foot a little more - you might expect us to be defending a little further up the pitch. Instead, it was far too easy for teams to play through us. It was far too easy for teams to pass through us and get the ball into our final third and into the penalty area.
We were perhaps slightly better at stopping teams carrying or dribbling the ball into dangerous positions. But it could be that teams did not need to try to dribble when it was possible to pass through us:
All of this resulted in it being easier for teams to get into dangerous positions a lot easier. We conceded more passes in our defensive third and penalty this season compared to last season.
The fact that we defending so deeply is demonstrated by the fact that, on average, Rui Patrício’s goalkeeping actions were much closer to his goalline than in previous seasons. In 2020/21, goalkeeping actions took place11.5 meters from goal (the closest to the goal in the league), down from 12.4m and 12.8m in previous seasons. On average, our goalkeepers touched the ball outside the penalty area once every six games. This is down from every 4.75 games in 2019/20 and every three matches in 2018/19.
I wonder how much Rui’s tendency to stay rooted to his goalline limits our ability to change how we play.
Of course, this is how we defend - we let teams come onto us and let them shoot from poor areas. The issue in 2020/21 was that we were giving up better quality chances than we have in previous years:
And that Rui was not saving shots at the same rate:
Given the constraints of this season, attempting a new style of play was always going to be difficult. Unfortunately, Nuno was not able to implement it. Ultimately, we ended up being a poorer version of how we had played in previous seasons.