Sam (Ethical Revolution) 🌱✌️ on Nostr: Agreed. They were unlucky they came up against a team that were better than they ...
Agreed. They were unlucky they came up against a team that were better than they could manage to be themselves on the day.
But they weren’t unlucky because xG had them 0.34 higher, especially when a penalty they missed added 0.79 to their xG score.
Focussing only on the stats takes out the nuance. To have watched that match from kick off to final whistle and come to the conclusion that Croatia were unlucky to have not got a result would be odd in my opinion.
Another view in the same vein would be to suggest that Messi is the luckiest player on the planet because the amount of goals he scored are way above his xG. The real reason is because he’s (just a little bit) better than average, which is of course what xG is based on. (On average a penalty will be scored 0.79 times out of 1)
But they weren’t unlucky because xG had them 0.34 higher, especially when a penalty they missed added 0.79 to their xG score.
Focussing only on the stats takes out the nuance. To have watched that match from kick off to final whistle and come to the conclusion that Croatia were unlucky to have not got a result would be odd in my opinion.
Another view in the same vein would be to suggest that Messi is the luckiest player on the planet because the amount of goals he scored are way above his xG. The real reason is because he’s (just a little bit) better than average, which is of course what xG is based on. (On average a penalty will be scored 0.79 times out of 1)