Foxy figures: 5 stats that explain Leicester City’s Premier League start
The first international break of the season is a chance to reset before the marathon begins in earnest. In the first Foxy Figures of the season, we look at what the first three games have taught us.
Leicester are, in some respects, the anti-data team.
Whether it’s 5000:1, getting relegated with the 7th highest wage bill in the league, or Brendan Rodgers single-handedly shredding the idea that having more possession gives you a better chance to win, we’ve made the numbers look stupid.
But we aren’t pig-headed enough to believe that those numbers can’t teach us anything. Every now and again, sticking your head into a spreadsheet for a few minutes can turn up a nugget of priceless information, like panning for gold at Legoland for the online generation.
At the very least, poring over a few statistics might teach us something about this Leicester side, about our strengths and weaknesses, or where we need to improve.
We’re going to check in every month or so to pick out some notable numbers from the season that help to explain whatever nonsense Leicester City Football Club is up to at that particular moment in time.
Some of these stats might be relevant, some might be meaningless. But we can have a little fun, can’t we?
1. All alone I fall to (set) pieces
The set piece coach has a hallowed place in recent Leicester City history. Like the #7 shirt at Manchester United or the #10 for Argentina, the role has been reverently passed down the generations, from ‘er, no one really’, to Lars ‘that bloke who couldn’t get a visa’ Knudsen, to the current inhabitant, a man named Andrew Hughes.
So, how’s our new man doing so far?
Eagle-eyed watchers may have noticed Tottenham almost scoring from a corner roughly 15 times in the first ten minutes of the season, followed by Rodrigo Muniz having about the same number of free headers in the next game. In this case, the numbers back up the eye test.
Through three games, Leicester have conceded 17 shots from set pieces, the most in the league, and are only behind Southampton in terms of expected goals (xG) conceded from them.
From OptaAnalyst
Our first offensive set piece of the season was a comically inept short free kick. And we also conceded from a training-ground routine against Aston Villa.
Not great, in other words.
The set piece problem has been particularly egregious because Leicester have conceded so many of them. A total of 24 so far is the third worst in the league. At the other end, we’ve had the fewest amount of corners (8) ourselves.
Leicester’s opponents have had so much of the ball in dangerous areas that conceding a lot of corners is, to some extent, inevitable. Contrasting the number of passes the opposition make in and around the penalty area, compared to what Leicester have done, helps to explain why even a team that is defending well is going to give away set pieces from blocks, tackles, and fouls in these areas.
Graphics from Between the Posts, they show all passes made from the most dangerous central areas.
This sort of pressure is not sustainable, particularly if you aren’t very good at defending dead ball situations (though it is worth noting that things did improve against Villa).
Perhaps Hughesy gets the boys up to speed over the international break, but the set piece problem has been around for a while. It might reflect some rust, a lack of leaders, or simply a lack of presence in the team. Either way, this is something to keep an eye on. Fine margins are important in a relegation battle, and this is a bad start.
2. First halves not so good
Another thing that has been pretty obvious to anyone watching these games is how slow Leicester have started. Against Spurs and Villa especially, a valiant recovery went some way to masking how poor the start was, but this is something Leicester are going to need to fix as well.
xG plots, which show us how a team accumulated its chances over the course of a game, do not make for pretty reading. Leicester have been like someone staggering in half an hour late for an interview. However good a talker you are from there, it’s gonna be tough to get hired.
Whether this is a direct result of Steve Cooper’s cautious team selections or simple a team that has been overwhelmed early by some well-honed attacking units is open to interpretation. Either way, these starts could have ended up with a far worse result than three half time scores of 0-1, 1-1, and 0-1, and probably will get more damaging if they keep up.
3. No chance that's what you got
One reason for that is the way Leicester have defended from open play. If we lived in the Rodgers dreamworld, where you can always smell the mince cooking, everyone operates at The Level, and set pieces don’t exist, the picture is a little rosier.
Leicester’s overall defensive performance is pretty good. Given how much the team has been dominated at times, you feel that previous sides would have given up a lot more shots and a lot more goals so far.
They’re roughly mid table both for xG conceded overall and shots conceded. In general, despite being camped in their own half, Leicester have given up lower quality shots than most teams. This speaks to the defensive organisation Cooper has been able to instil, as well as to the desire and energy levels of the players themselves.
Via OptaAnalyst
A couple of years ago Rodgers’ Leicester had the exact opposite issue: a smaller number of high quality shots, with opponents seemingly able to score at will whenever they took aim. Which brings us to…
4. Mads fer it
We’re going to caveat this section by saying that goalkeeping stats can be a little weird. But based on the theory that if your list of numbers presents Alisson, Bernd Leo, and David Raya as the three best ‘keepers it seems fair enough to trust them, we’re going to dive into FBref’s data and take a look.
You may remember that two years ago, for reasons that have still never quite been adequately explained, Danny Ward was the Leicester City goalkeeper.
Two seasons ago, Ward ranked 35th out of 39 ‘keepers for ‘post-shot expected goals’, essentially a measure of how likely a shot is to go in after it’s taken. This can be bad luck (a shot takes a massive deflection, for instance), or it can be wild incompetence. I’ll leave you to decide which applied here.
No-one needs telling that Mads Hermansen is better than Ward, but it is worth dwelling on the fine margins again. Had Leicester had a semi-competent goalkeeper in 2022/23, we would not have gone down. So far this season, Hermansen has suggested he is that: he is 7th out of 26 ‘keepers by the same metric.
This is one to watch as the season develops: how good is he? And how is his passing out from the back going to change under Cooper compared to last season?
So far, he’s still going long at a similar rate (40% of goal kicks longer than 40 yards, compared to 33% last season). Is that going to hold up, or will Odsonne Edouard’s (mildly) greater physical presence allow Leicester to mix it up a bit?
5. No chance that's what we got
One of the most talked about problems so far has been the lack of creativity going forward. This, unsurprisingly, is borne out by the numbers.
Leicester rank 19th for xG, 19th for shots, and 19th for the number of touches taken in the box. The only team below them on all these metrics is Ipswich, who have played both Liverpool and Manchester City already. Leicester are dead last for touches in the final third.
Perhaps the most entertaining stat amongst this dirge is that Leicester rank 1st for average shot distance. So we take the second fewest shots in the league and take them from the furthest away of anyone (20.2 yards, if you’re interested).
And yes, we can probably blame Abdul Fatawu (5 shots, from an average of 30.1 yards away) for this. Don’t sleep on Jordan Ayew (2 shots, 29.8 yards) either, though one of them was at least a free kick. The xG map from the Villa game sums up the problem pretty well - small dots from far away are bad.
From Between the Posts
This is the area we most want to see an improvement in over the next few weeks. Can Bilal El Khannouss add the creative spark Leicester are missing? Or can Cooper cook up some quality in attacking areas?
That creativity is badly needed. So far, there have been very few genuine chances (big dots from close range, like all the ones Villa had above) created at all, which explains both the poor xG numbers and the fact Jamie Vardy has only had two shots all season.
Leicester’s leader in ‘shot creating actions’ - does exactly what it says on the tin: actions that lead directly to a shot, such as dribbles, passes, or crosses - so far is Victor Kristiansen, and he ranks 73rd in the league, which rather says it all.
Interested observers may note that if you adjusted that stat so that it ranked players according to how many shot creating actions they performed per 90 minutes of action, Stephy Mavididi would rank 6th in the entire league, nestled around the likes of Jack Grealish, Cole Palmer, and James Maddison, but he hasn’t quite played enough minutes to qualify.
The positive spin on Leicester’s first three games is that, given the flux in the squad and the lack of attacking options Cooper had at his disposal, it’s the worst we’ll look all season.
Any way you look at it, the attacking metrics are bad. What you can see, though, is the outline of a solid defensive unit (corners aside). Combine this with more quality going forward and you’re golden, although that is obviously easier said than done.
How Cooper adds that attacking element is the main thing to watch over the next few games. Are we going to see him change the style in any way, or is it simply about relying on better players in the same system?
And will we ever learn how to defend a corner?
