Do we have the best attack in the league?

[AshtonRobin21]

A question I never would have dreamed of a couple of seasons ago.

However, I am now wondering, do we have one of the best strike force's in the league? 

Granted the likes of Watford, may look strong on paper with Pedro and Sarr. They are extremely talented players, but they are not regular goalscorers. 

In regards to depth, I would certainly argue that we are one of the best in the division. I believe any of our first 5 options (Weimann, Semenyo, Conway, Wells and Martin) could get a minimum of 10 goals per season. 

Which then poses the question, How successful could we be this season if we can keep the ball out of our own net? 

I'm excited for every game at the moment. There's a belief that we can outscore any team in the league. If our defence clicks, we could make a serious push this season. 

*I find it even more impressive that Nige hasn't bought one striker during his time with us. Everyone was calling for us to sign a striker (even during Holden's time with us), but Nige has got a tune out of the players already at the club. 

[Robbored]

The current City strike force is certainly one of the best in the Championship with creative midfield to supply the opportunities - just a matter of defending for the entire game now……….

[INCRED]

6 minutes ago, Robbored said:

The current City strike force is certainly one of the best in the Championship with creative midfield to supply the opportunities - just a matter of defending for the entire game now……….

We are one very good defender away from being a realistic top 6 team 

[AshtonRobin21]

1 minute ago, INCRED said:

We are one very good defender away from being a realistic top 6 team 

I agree. The sooner Kalas returns to full fitness, the better. 

If he can return to previous form, we could be very strong. 

Fine margins in this division. 

[ExiledAjax]

35 minutes ago, AshtonRobin21 said:

However, I am now wondering, do we have one of the best strike force's in the league? 

In these early days, yes. Best shot on target conversion rate. 4th best general shot conversion rate. Second highest xG generated from open play. It's a dangerous attack that creates quality chances and finishes them with aplomb.

Edit: to add, the attack has been consistent in that threat creation as well.

In the 6 league games so far we've seen xG ratings of 1.17, 1.22, 1.53, 0.91, 1.40, 1.73 and 1.92. so almost all above 1 but no single game is dramatically skewing our average of 1.45.

An average xG of 0.134 per shot is very good, and compares favourably to the 0.097 of our opponent's shots. Essentially our average shot from open play has a 13.4% chance of becoming a goal, the shots our opponents take has a 9.7% chance of doing the same. That's good.

All of these numbers are a good deal better than the averages for the whole of last season.

35 minutes ago, AshtonRobin21 said:

Which then poses the question, How successful could we be this season if we can keep the ball out of our own net? 

Very. We could also improve by generating more opportunities for our strikers to score. We're effective, and we're clinical in our finishing, but we're not prolific chance/shot creators. We finish many of those we do create, but it's very much quality rather than quantity that is getting our goals scored column up.

35 minutes ago, AshtonRobin21 said:

Everyone was calling for us to sign a striker (even during Holden's time with us), but Nige has got a tune out of the players already at the club. 

We weren't all calling for a striker to be signed.

Edited August 29, 2022 by ExiledAjax

[Alex_BCFC]

Swap Vyner out and improve the central midfield by getting Scott in there rather than right wing and we have a side I’d hope would be even better than the top 10 finish I thought was possible at start of season. If we lost Semenyo though then would reconsider. 

[Numero Uno]

We play the most “open” game in the Championship to suit the personnel available. I think that’s a plain fact. The obvious flaw in that strategy in terms of finishing top half of the league is we need better defensive players who make less individual errors to make it work.

However if Nige can make it work “enough” to avoid looking over our shoulders I would take a mid table finish watching this style of football (and the frustrations that go with it) over anything that has preceded it over the last 5 years……..all day long.

When the FFP situation eases there might be a lot to look forward to.

[Mr Popodopolous]

It's debatable, we don't get referenced much by fans of other clubs but so far, our 5 strikers have 9 between them in the League. Other fans of other clubs are like 'Oh Sarr, Pedro etc' or Idk 'Gayle, Campbell, Delap, Brown' so I dunno if we are seen in such terms but the output last and this season has been very good to date.

Did Mr. Rooney not label our front 3 one of the best in the Championship last season- that was pre return, improvement, redemption whatever you want to call it of Wells or proper emergence of Conway.

Edited August 29, 2022 by Mr Popodopolous

[HappyClapper]

This illustrates @ExiledAjax’s point about second in xG. Coupled with our chance conversion that is quite a potent combination. 

[Numero Uno]

2 minutes ago, HappyClapper said:

This illustrates @ExiledAjax’s point about second in xG. Coupled with our chance conversion that is quite a potent combination. 

I don’t take xG as fact but it wasn’t too long ago we would have been right at the bottom of that table.

[Numero Uno]

22 minutes ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

It's debatable, we don't get referenced much by fans of other clubs but so far, our 5 strikers have 9 between them in the League. Other fans of other clubs are like 'Oh Sarr, Pedro etc' or Idk 'Gayle, Campbell, Delap, Brown' so I dunno if we are seen in such terms but the output last and this season has very good to date.

Did Mr. Rooney not label our front 3 one of the best in the Championship last season- that was pre return of Wells or proper emergence of Conway.

What we are showing is that if the front three do the right things, make the right runs etc. they don’t need to be seen as the best individuals by others. Look at Conway in the last couple of weeks, one run where he peels to the far post, tap in, holds his position at the near post, free header, another run he attacks the near post, another tap in (albeit a great finish too). That movement and decision making, if he keeps it up, is a wide players dream because all they have to do is hit “areas”.

Edited August 29, 2022 by Numero Uno

[Simon79]

Currently we probably do, certainly right up there. But people have to remember that Conway hasn’t played many games & his form will likely dip, which is to be expected at his age. You then hope that the next man in, takes his chance. Something  Nige has repeatedly mentioned. But this like you mention, is we are really blessed with the depth. All of our forward players would get in most Championship squads & probably starting eleven. Think they all add something different, even the recently criticised Martin (good at what he does & probably under appreciated). If we can sort out the lapses in concentration ( it’s not system or formations), I see no reason not to be pushing top 6. COYR 

[Lew-T]

46 minutes ago, INCRED said:

We are one very good defender away from being a realistic top 6 team 

Starting eleven yes.

[ExiledAjax]

4 minutes ago, Numero Uno said:

I don’t take xG as fact but it wasn’t too long ago we would have been right at the bottom of that table.

xG often gets mis-used to say that a team "should" have won a game or such. However, if you want to consider attacking effectiveness or threat as a whole and across many games, then it's about the best metric we've got. I'm quite happy to look at images like the one posted by @HappyClapper and at tabels and graphs that show xG, and say that yeh, we've got a dangerous attack. When you take that image and compare it to this table of shots and where they are taken:

Then you start to see that we're dangerous because we shoot in the box. We're bang in mid-table for total shots taken, but we're 10th for shots in the box and 8th in the 6-yard box, and we're 19th for shots out of the box. So we shoot from close.

Then you can look at individual player conversion rates and you see that of the 44 players to have attempted 10+ shots this season we have Conway and Weimann in mid-table for total shots taken (14 and 11 respectively), but they are both much higher up when you rank those 44 by things like shot on target %, shot conversion rate, etc. So the individuals are performing in line with the team, or perhaps it s the other way round. Either way it's not luck.

35 minutes ago, Alex_BCFC said:

If we lost Semenyo though then would reconsider. 

Why? The very good numbers posted so far have largely been without Semenyo's involvement. He's a good player, and fits our play well, but if he leaves I am confident we can continue scoring at a good rate. There's nothing in the stats that suggests we have really suffered in his absence. We saw similar this time last season when he was out with injury. He may improve us, but we're also more than capable of being dangerous without him.

[Dolman_Stand]

Being joint top scorers would suggest we are pretty close

[Mad Cyril]

If we can score more goals than we concede in each game, there is a fair chance we might move up the table.

[Judda]

Whats xG?

[The Swan and Cemetery]

Not sure the last time we had a fox in the box, but Conway adds that option (Wells seems to operate slightly wider and maybe Weimann could be if played slightly differently but adds so much behind the strikers). Can’t remember who the last fox in the box was for us (temporary maybe Tammy? Perm?) but they’re worth their weight in gold. Accept though that TC may go through a dip, albeit he doesn’t seem impacted when he misses chances. 

[ExiledAjax]

4 minutes ago, Judda said:

Whats xG?

It stands for "Expected Goals".

In brief - each shot taken by a team is given a score of between 0 and 1. The closer to 1 it is, the more likely it is to result in a goal. The score a shot is given is derived from analysis of thousands of historical games at all levels.

For example a penalty will get an xG score of about 0.78 because history shows that about 78% of penalties are scored. A speculative long range shot might only register 0.01 because only about 1% of that type of shot ever goes in.

Essentially it's a refinement of just looking at how many shots or shots on target a team takes, so allowing us to pick out anomalies. Preston are a great example right now. They've been recording 0-0 results with alarming frequency, but their xG scores are pretty normal. That suggests that it's not an impotency of attack that is depriving them of goals but bad luck, good goalkeeping, or a combination of those factors.

[Davefevs]

1 hour ago, ExiledAjax said:

We weren't all calling for a striker to be signed.

Indeed.

Some posters might’ve been referring to a scenario where Semenyo left in fairness, but even if he doesn’t it’s not the priority for me.

Without the emergence of Conway as a genuine first teamer we still had Wells, Martin and Weimann…with Conway as an up and coming back up.

His emergence means we can keep Weimann in the attacking midfield role.

As @AshtonRobin21says, priority is a fit Centre-Back, that could be Kalas.

4 minutes ago, The Swan and Cemetery said:

Not sure the last time we had a fox in the box, but Conway adds that option (Wells seems to operate slightly wider and maybe Weimann could be if played slightly differently but adds so much behind the strikers). Can’t remember who the last fox in the box was for us (temporary maybe Tammy? Perm?) but they’re worth their weight in gold. Accept though that TC may go through a dip, albeit he doesn’t seem impacted when he misses chances. 

Lita / Goater?  Others I’m sure.

[Alex_BCFC]

36 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

xG often gets mis-used to say that a team "should" have won a game or such. However, if you want to consider attacking effectiveness or threat as a whole and across many games, then it's about the best metric we've got. I'm quite happy to look at images like the one posted by @HappyClapper and at tabels and graphs that show xG, and say that yeh, we've got a dangerous attack. When you take that image and compare it to this table of shots and where they are taken:

Then you start to see that we're dangerous because we shoot in the box. We're bang in mid-table for total shots taken, but we're 10th for shots in the box and 8th in the 6-yard box, and we're 19th for shots out of the box. So we shoot from close.

Then you can look at individual player conversion rates and you see that of the 44 players to have attempted 10+ shots this season we have Conway and Weimann in mid-table for total shots taken (14 and 11 respectively), but they are both much higher up when you rank those 44 by things like shot on target %, shot conversion rate, etc. So the individuals are performing in line with the team, or perhaps it s the other way round. Either way it's not luck.

Why? The very good numbers posted so far have largely been without Semenyo's involvement. He's a good player, and fits our play well, but if he leaves I am confident we can continue scoring at a good rate. There's nothing in the stats that suggests we have really suffered in his absence. We saw similar this time last season when he was out with injury. He may improve us, but we're also more than capable of being dangerous without him.

They have but that’s over a short period of games and Conway hasn’t played a full season yet. That is why I would reconsider. We struggled a lot without Semenyo last season and if Conway doesn’t keep up form then I doubt we would be top 6 material. A lot of suddenly expected of Conway - he looks a prospect but it is still early days. 

[LondonBristolian]

14 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Indeed.

Some posters might’ve been referring to a scenario where Semenyo left in fairness, but even if he doesn’t it’s not the priority for me.

Without the emergence of Conway as a genuine first teamer we still had Wells, Martin and Weimann…with Conway as an up and coming back up.

His emergence means we can keep Weimann in the attacking midfield role.

As @AshtonRobin21says, priority is a fit Centre-Back, that could be Kalas.

Lita / Goater?  Others I’m sure.

I have to admit I'm quite worried about Kalas. He's not played for quite some time and the uncertainty around his return makes me think it may be something that is not straight forward. It's far from clear when he'll be back, when he'll be ready to play two games a week and whether there's a risk of recurrence. I also think that we brought in our current formation around the time he got injured so he's never played with Naismith, barely played with Klose and we don't yet know how he will fit the system.

I think Vyner gets some unfair flack but I do think - between his inconsistency and Kalas' fitness - that is likely to be our Achilles heel assuming no funds suddenly appear before Thursday. 

[Fordy62]

I think we have the most in form attack in the league right now. Good, but probably not best. 

[GrahamC]

2 minutes ago, LondonBristolian said:

I have to admit I'm quite worried about Kalas. He's not played for quite some time and the uncertainty around his return makes me think it may be something that is not straight forward. It's far from clear when he'll be back, when he'll be ready to play two games a week and whether there's a risk of recurrence. I also think that we brought in our current formation around the time he got injured so he's never played with Naismith, barely played with Klose and we don't yet know how he will fit the system.

I think Vyner gets some unfair flack but I do think - between his inconsistency and Kalas' fitness - that is likely to be our Achilles heel assuming no funds suddenly appear before Thursday. 

Me too.

The rumour that he isn’t training at present is a real worry, as now that Baker’s future is officially settled we effectively have 4 centre backs fit plus Towler & we play a 3.

If any funds did become available as a result of Semenyo or Scott leaving it would be by far our biggest priority.

[Tim Monaghan]

32 minutes ago, ExiledAjax said:

It stands for "Expected Goals".

In brief - each shot taken by a team is given a score of between 0 and 1. The closer to 1 it is, the more likely it is to result in a goal. The score a shot is given is derived from analysis of thousands of historical games at all levels.

For example a penalty will get an xG score of about 0.78 because history shows that about 78% of penalties are scored. A speculative long range shot might only register 0.01 because only about 1% of that type of shot ever goes in.

Essentially it's a refinement of just looking at how many shots or shots on target a team takes, so allowing us to pick out anomalies. Preston are a great example right now. They've been recording 0-0 results with alarming frequency, but their xG scores are pretty normal. That suggests that it's not an impotency of attack that is depriving them of goals but bad luck, good goalkeeping, or a combination of those factors.

Thanks for this, that was a really interesting read. 

[slartibartfast]

2 hours ago, Robbored said:

The current City strike force is certainly one of the best in the Championship with creative midfield to supply the opportunities - just a matter of defending for the entire game now……….

You score 3, we'll score 4 .

[Port Said Red]

1 hour ago, The Swan and Cemetery said:

Not sure the last time we had a fox in the box, but Conway adds that option (Wells seems to operate slightly wider and maybe Weimann could be if played slightly differently but adds so much behind the strikers). Can’t remember who the last fox in the box was for us (temporary maybe Tammy? Perm?) but they’re worth their weight in gold. Accept though that TC may go through a dip, albeit he doesn’t seem impacted when he misses chances. 

I definitely thought of Tammy when I saw Conways finish on Saturday. Quick movement and an understanding that he just had to hit the target and the odds would be in his favour.

[Sir Geoff]

3 hours ago, GrahamC said:

Me too.

The rumour that he isn’t training at present is a real worry, as now that Baker’s future is officially settled we effectively have 4 centre backs fit plus Towler & we play a 3.

If any funds did become available as a result of Semenyo or Scott leaving it would be by far our biggest priority.

Bamba ?

[GrahamC]

2 minutes ago, Sir Geoff said:

Bamba ?

Quite possibly, NP was still a bit noncommittal in today’s press conference about whether he is staying on.

Edited August 29, 2022 by GrahamC

[downendcity]

4 hours ago, Mad Cyril said:

If we can score more goals than we concede in each game, there is a fair chance we might move up the table.

Nigel  has torn up his coaching manual and is briefing his coaching team with the contents of Cyril's post as we speak.