Davefevs

That is definitely much clearer….thanks. And also why HMRC is so high. So disingenuous to say wages down, when you’re not paying HMRC…..who would ever guess Melly Mel would try to dupe everyone with a hard luck story. He has certainly confirmed he isn’t an accountant, but someone who wants to try every little way to bend the rules. His Accountants and Auditors reputations must have taken a hit too?

I genuinely think that is “people” misinterpreting when MM says he has covered the losses / wages with £1.2-1.5m per month. I think they are forgetting there are some revenues also helping to cover the bills too.

No idea actually. I’m Ghana guess - nope.

Yep, it’s useful to understand team style…..there is no magic system / style…..no correlation to league position is attempted. I used a similar chart a lot last season in my “what can we expect” pre-match write-ups.

8 out of 10 statisticians prefer them.

tomorrow night might be two fairly similar teams in style! As @ExiledAjaxsaid above, here’s the table:- open play only.

Paternity leave…..just had a little boy. Gregory Gregor McGregor. Okay, it’s Reuben McGregor.

Only because I had good feedback / ideas ?

Yes, I’m sure on the basis that there was no fee we have a tidy percentage sell-on.

Yep, you may have noticed I added some additional overlays (box plot / whiskers) to my charts since you looked at them a couple of weeks ago….to show the quartile ranges. For the rest of you, the middle line, each coloured blob represents shots conceded in each match. The colour the opposition kit colour. Some blobs sit on top of each other. The two on the right are Luton (orange) and Fulham (grey - they don’t do white). QPR (light blue) is hidden by Fulham. But you can see how those 3 games are out of kilter with a much more solid defensive effort in the other 6 games. But of course I can’t pick and choose the games to prove things….but those 6 games were good signs. Hoping we get back to those numbers.

Yes, getting great reviews. Made a few worldy saves too.

Are you really Bernie Taupin? You just need Reg Dwight and I can see a big career in music kicking off.

That’s a pretty good summary, reasons to not get ahead of ourselves just because we are 8th. The last 3 games have knocked quite a few of the stats back, yet we’ve picked up 5 points from 3 games. Up until the last 2 we were trending mid-table for lots of them. Think we will see a lot of games 1-0, 1-1, 0-1. Two less stellar opponents coming up. Might get to see those recent shots conceded numbers go back down. If not, regardless of result, I’d have some concerns.

Yep, recently turned 25, and made very few 1st team league apps in his career to that point….all at Lg2 (19 inc 9 this season) bar 2 at Lg1 last season. To me it was no surprise that he didn’t get a gig higher than Lg2. And fair play to how he’s started at Swindon. His FGR loan started well, but he made a couple of mistakes with the ball at his feet and got a red card as a result. That will have played a part in any scouting report.

From Matt Slater - Athletic Every day is a school day for Derby County supporters at the moment and Thursday’s curriculum included lessons on teaser documents, preferential creditors and manager Wayne Rooney’s favourite Only Fools and Horses scene with Terrence Aubrey “Boycie” Boyce. The latter revelation came 10 minutes into the third big Derby-related interview of the day: Rooney’s pre-Saturday chat with the local press. Given recent events, there was a lot more to talk about than groin strains but the 35-year-old cannot have been expecting a request for a tribute to the actor who played Boycie, John Challis, who died last week. Like so much else that has been thrown his way of late, Rooney handled it beautifully. “First of all, condolences to his family — it’s very sad news,” he said. “I was actually watching Only Fools and Horses last night, being honest, so, yeah, there are a lot of moments in there. I think when (Boycie’s wife) Marlene got breast implants and Del Boy wound Boycie up, was one of the best moments for me.” Sad news, boobs, wind-ups… it has been that kind of week at Pride Park. Earlier on Thursday, insolvency experts Andrew Hosking and Carl Jackson held their first press conference since being appointed as joint administrators of the cash-strapped club. To their credit, they answered a lot of questions and they explained how they were appointed, what the next two weeks look like, and how fans can still help the club. They admitted that Derby’s debts were substantial but said those IOUs were now frozen by the administration process, and that any new owner could negotiate a significant “discount” on them, a change in circumstances that immediately makes the club more attractive to potential buyers. This, they claimed, is why half a dozen “serious and well-funded” parties have already expressed an interest in rescuing the business. They also said they had already met representatives of the supporters’ trust, which, under English Football League rules, has 28 days to put a bid together for the club, and had told Rooney and his players that they had no intention to start ripping up their contracts or flogging them off in a clearance sale. There were a few references to “inevitable bumps in the road” and the need to cut costs but, overall, the message was confident and upbeat. In fact, when pushed for an answer on how confident they were that Derby County could be saved, Hosking said: “Contrary to a podcast I heard this week, I don’t consider this to be another Bury. “Barristers never offer better chances than 60 to 70 per cent in any case but I think there is a 95 per cent chance this will be restructured. Look, I’m confident.” Jackson, who looked a little uncomfortable as Hosking chose not to duck that bouncer, added: “I wasn’t sure if Andrew would put a number on it but, yes, I’ll back that.” Derby, courtesy of being deducted 12 points, are bottom of the Championship (Photo: Bradley Collyer/PA Images via Getty Images) In terms of saying what fans, players and staff wanted to hear this week, Hosking and Jackson ticked every box. Money to pay next week’s wage bill? Check. No fire sale? Yep. Commitment to fulfil the fixtures? Absolutely. People still want to buy us? Sure. The press conference, however, had a different impact on the rest of the football industry. When The Athletic contacted EFL club bosses, insolvency experts and potential investors on Thursday for their thoughts on the Derby administration’s bold beginning, the responses ranged from “good luck” to “good grief”. The reasons for this are fairly simple. One, Derby’s debts are massive and a huge slice of what they owe is either secured against the property assets or has preferential status in law — getting the owners of these debts to accept pennies in the pound will not be nearly as straightforward as Hosking and Jackson implied. Two, the administrators claimed they can more than half the club’s running costs now that it no longer has to meet the obligations of any payment plan it has set up with creditors. That bit is true but nobody believes a moratorium on the debts is going to slice “more than 50 per cent” from the club’s monthly costs. The only way to do that is to let people go. The administrators have two weeks to decide who they absolutely cannot do without to put the games on or they will assume all of the club’s contracts. There is some very bad news coming down the road and it will feel like more than a “few bumps” for those on the wrong end of it. Three, nobody is looking to buy Derby County now who was not looking at them last week. The price was too high then, not to mention the future liabilities and uncertainty over which division Derby will be in next season (or the one after that), and it is unclear how much has changed. And four, the administrators admitted, almost breezily, that they need another loan to fund the club until January, which is the shortest possible window to achieve a sale this complicated. Just let that settle in for a moment. Mel Morris, the former owner, has just decided enough is enough after injecting over £200 million into Derby since 2014. The club owes almost £30 million to the tax man, £20 million to a US investment firm, £10 million to other clubs, former staff and other individuals who come under the “football creditors” bracket, who must be paid in full, and a similar sum to the usual cast of hundreds who have provided food, office supplies or their time to the club. And even after drastic cuts to the playing budget over the last 18 months, the club is still losing about £15 million a year. But the administrators say they are currently in talks with four different lenders about “short-term funding”. How and when this loan will be repaid, or what interest this lender will charge, was not explained. Later on Thursday, EFL chief executive Trevor Birch, an accountant by trade who has done a few football administrations himself, was asked if this was a bit unusual. “I haven’t used it in a football insolvency but I believe there may be lenders willing to do it if they get super-priority,” he said. We asked another insolvency expert the same question and he was less diplomatic: “It’s unheard of. They must be mad.” To be fair to Jackson, he did admit “we don’t have much choice”. Birch, however, was also asked about the administrators’ belief that HM Revenue and Customs will just have to accept whatever pennies-in-the-pound offer Hosking, Jackson and their fellow joint-administrator Andrew Andronikou can come up with. “I share your scepticism that it will be a simple situation with HMRC,” said Birch. “It’s the first administration since 2002 where they’ve had preferential status. It will be interesting to see how they vote in any (Company Voluntary Arrangement) or alternative exit route.” This is a reference to the fact that the UK government last year restored HMRC’s status as a preferential creditor in insolvencies, which means administrators can no longer discriminate against the taxman when the final divvying up of the assets takes place. If Arsenal are going to get paid in full for the money Derby owe them, so is the crown. Nobody is suggesting these are easy issues to communicate and several sources have pointed out that all football administrations look awful to begin with but usually end up with a positive result. It is also important to note that the administrators, Birch and Rooney all said they would do all in their power to save this club, which was a founding member of the Football League in 1888 and a member of the Premier League as recently as 2008. But misplaced confidence, risk-taking and attempts to hide bad numbers are all causes of Derby’s current predicament. The only way the club survives this crisis is if it is honest with itself, its fans, its creditors and its potential saviours. Otherwise, only a fool or somebody horsing about will even look at them.

I was agreeing with you. I quite liked the attritional team of Autumn 17….we suffocated teams with our 460 with 4 CBs, a LB on the LW and a CM playing RW. I don’t think that it ever got better for LJ than that. The winning run of 18/19 never felt the same as 17/18 (and I’m not talking about the cups either).

Smokey….who the eff is Kalas

I can’t be arsed to manually work it out, but in 17/18 the drop off of shots in the second half of the season was significant. Okay, I could be arsed. 12.96 in 2017 (5.08 on target) 9.47 in 2018 (3.19 on target) 9.19 without the 20 shots in the 5-5 v Hull

17/18 - 11.37 shots per match at 37.1% on target This season - 10.11 at 34%

52.8 back passes per match last season. 44 this season. 57 was peak Johnson…..in 17/18….but we also made 100 more passes per match overall than we have this season. So above numbers a bit impacted by number of passes made.

I wonder if you can record live, e.g. hit record button whilst playing live (then switch tv off).

There are about 90 different data points. Here’s a group of 11 of them in one picture. Starting top left - Ball recoveries: a slight improvement on last season Ball recoveries high up the pitch (in opposition third): huge improvement on last season Ball recoveries medium (middle third): slight improvement on last season Ball recoveries low (in our own third): a bit down on last season, but we are defending less in the main. Ball losses: same as last season, and a tad more than Champ average Ball losses high: if we are losing the ball it’s high up the pitch….good sign Ball losses medium: ditto Ball losses low (our own third: well down, which is good, e.g. we aren’t putting ourselves in trouble Interceptions: down on last season, low against Champ average, some of which is because we are defending less Fouls: down on last season, lower than Champ average. Read into that what you want. From the eye I’d say we are more physical, but perhaps execute our tackles better. Clearances: I’m not particularly interested in this one, but perhaps it shows a little less panic. So that’s my reading of them, but still subjective to some extent….and it’s far better when you put several together to form a view. You can apply similar thinking to each tab in the above link.

Anyone managed to record a red button game on sky Q this season?

Semenyo and Scott - knocks, precautions not to include them on Saturday (Curtis Fleming).

You won’t be surprised to know I have a whole host of stats comparing: City this season versus City last season versus the Championship this season https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/fevsfootballanalytics/viz/BristolCityTeamStats2021-22/xGpershot various tabs. Here’s an example of one. For me, it’s looking beyond the numbers, at things like shape w/o the ball, press, etc, and translating that back. Others like goals from set-pieces, etc are a definite improvement. Before the last 3 games, shots conceded was pretty low….but 6 games is a small sample. 9 isn’t a huge sample either.