There was a period when datawallahs insisted confidence didn’t exist – which came as a surprise to almost everybody who has ever played sport at any level. There are days when you feel invincible, when every putt drops, when every ball pitches in the right place, when you claim every cross. And there are days when your club may as well be a Toblerone, when catching the easiest dolly seems an impossible feat of calculation and coordination, when your legs simply will not function. Vast screeds were written dismissing the “hot-hand fallacy”.
Then, in 2020, the journalist Ben Cohen wrote The Hot Hand, which demonstrated a flaw in previous calculations and decided that the hot hand – a term from basketball referring to a player on a scoring streak – does exist. From a layman’s perspective, the tests employed always seemed so artificial to be highly questionable anyway. And it always seemed a little odd that two of the real boom areas of sports science – data analytics and psychology – would take up apparently contradictory positions: one insisting a positive mental outlook meant nothing and the other that it was essential.
So confidence in sport exists and we’re allowed to talk about it without boffins sighing disapprovingly. Which brings us to Nottingham Forest, who before the weekend fixtures sat third in the Premier League having taken four points off the league leaders Liverpool this season. There was a lot of discussion after their draw on Tuesday about whether Nuno Espírito Santo’s side had deserved it, but “deserve” is always a confusing concept in football. The result is the result and, although Liverpool won the xG 2.0–0.3, to say that Forest were somehow lucky is to ignore both how comfortable they seemed in the first three-quarters of the game, and the consistency of their results this season.
Only Tottenham have outperformed their xG goal-difference by more than Forest this season. (That in itself is a slightly weird detail given context by the fact that, if Spurs have an xG advantage, they tend to win comfortably – for instance beating Southampton 5-0 when their xG was only 1.5 better, or Manchester City 4-0 when their xG was only 0.4 better). Over the season, Forest’s goal difference is 7.5 goals better than their xG difference.
This season, it has become common after an Arsenal failure to win for Mikel Arteta to point out how dominant his side was. “Incredible how you don’t win that game,” he said after losing on penalties to Manchester United in the FA Cup last Sunday. “The dominance, the superiority in relationship to the opposition.” After the draw against Fulham, he said: “This is the quality of the opposition, with one chance they score a goal. And then the margins of the league as well. [But] for millimetres we could have been sitting here with three points. Now we have to look at what we can do better so that the opposition have zero chances to win the game.” When Arsenal failed to break down Everton last month, he spoke of how a team has “to try to generate the highest winning probability.”
All of which is true. The likelihood in all those games was that Arsenal would win – and yet they won none of them. The question is: is that freakish, or is that the result of a lack of edge, a lack of hardness, a lack of a top-class centre-forward? Yet for all their recent struggles in front of goal, Arsenal have outperformed their own xG by 41 to 36.5 in the league this season.
For Forest, the question is similar. It may be – in fact it’s likely – that as the season goes on their form will fade and reality and xG will draw closer together. But does that mean Forest’s position is a fluke? Perhaps it is and we’re simply conditioned to find explanations: mankind cannot cope with too much randomness and so has always to find patterns and explanations.
But it certainly feels as though Forest have hit upon an extremely effective method. In Murillo and Nikola Milenkovic they have two authoritative central defenders. The two exceptional saves Matz Sels made against Liverpool were in keeping with his performances this season. Those three are part of a solid structure, aided by a pair of deep-lying central midfielders – Elliot Anderson has stood out – and full-backs having fine seasons; Neco Williams effectively neutralised Mohamed Salah on Tuesday. Forest have conceded 20 goals with an xG against of 23.7 – not only have they got the second-best xG against in the league (behind Arsenal) but the excellence of Sels, who has the second-best shots saved percentage in the division, means they are outperforming it.
Forest’s attacking method is straightforward: using the pace and direct running of Callum Hudson-Odoi and Anthony Elanga to exploit the space behind opponents drawn forward by their preference for sitting deep and playing without the ball (nobody, not even Everton, has had a lower percentage possession in the Premier League this season). Chris Wood is the ideal target for playing long from the back, and is scoring goals, with Morgan Gibbs-White, all energy and invention, knitting everything together.
after newsletter promotion
Their xG is only the 15th best in the Premier League, but they have outscored it by 3.8. It may be that that is unsustainable, and it is largely a result of Wood scoring 5.2 goals more than his xG but then, when a team plays so absolutely to a striker’s strengths, perhaps that is not entirely unexpected. And once it is accepted that confidence exists, success – and failure – is to an extent self-perpetuating.
Forest’s simplicity is deceptive: it looks easy because it is so well planned, players who fit together in a cohesive system – something that, it has to be said, never seemed plausible amid the trolley-dash that followed promotion. They have been fortunate with injuries – only three sides have had fewer lost days this season – but Forest are a triumph of Nuno’s clarity of vision. As games have been won, confidence has blossomed and Forest have played better and better.
Fatigue, injury and regression to the mean probably will catch up with them at some stage, but that doesn’t mean their success is in any way lucky or undeserved. Outperforming expectation is what good management looks like.
Source: theguardian.com
