Where Goals Come From — American Soccer Analysis
Conclusion
The five goal categories are the first aspect of the “Where Goals Come From” framework to help improve communication about goal differential in a club. Key points:
Regardless of league or level, goals are scored in the professional game at the same rate in very similar ways.
There are five goal categories: Progressive Pass, Basic Pass, Set Piece Pass, Individual Play, and Set Piece Kick. 40% of goals come from the Progressive Pass category.
A club can build its on-field strategy for how to maximize goal differential using these five goal categories. By focusing the team’s game model on a subset of these goal categories, a club can improve in specific areas.
The most important goal category is the Progressive Pass category which is usually the best indicator of the overall goal differential for the team.
The categories can aid basic team- and player-level analysis. Future articles will build on this.
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Future Analysis
Please follow American Soccer Analysis, Jamon Moore, and Carl Carpenter on Twitter for future work on this project. Here are some of the things you can look forward in 2021:
For coaches
Deep dive on Progressive Pass types and when to use each of them
Video examples of how to create the right key pass or prevent them
When to play passes in the air versus on the ground
Good, better, and best: making expected goals useful in your practice and game model
For club executives
Creating a sporting culture around goal differential: lessons on business agility for a football club
For analysts
Types of key passes and expected goal modeling
Phase-of-play and speed-of-play effects on key pass effectiveness
Secondary and tertiary key pass analysis across the top leagues
Additional deep dives into the Basic Pass, Individual Play, and Set Piece Pass categories
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About Jamon Moore
Jamon is a twenty-five-year professional in the high-technology industry who started as a software developer and is now in executive management overseeing business agility transformations with a specialization in high-technology. Jamon is an analyst for American Soccer Analysis, runs the Quakes Epicenter website covering the San Jose Earthquakes in Major League Soccer, and is a host of the Black and Azul webshow, now beginning its third season, which also covers the San Jose Earthquakes. Jamon has been a coach and assistant coach for several competitive youth soccer teams in the Bay Area. Jamon can be contacted via Twitter, and club analysts and executives can connect with Jamon on LinkedIn.
About Carlon Carpenter
Carlon is the current Tactical & Video Analyst for StatsBomb, one of the largest soccer data companies in Europe. His role at StatsBomb is focused on providing insights into video analysis and providing clients with support into incorporating data analysis into their workflow: be it through opposition analysis or scouting. Other responsibilities include providing guidance, feedback, and expertise in required functionality for video platforms, as well as applying StatsBomb’s data into “on the pitch” functionality. Carlon also works as a contract employee for the U.S. Soccer youth national teams, working as a performance analyst for the U-17 men’s national team. Previously, Carlon worked for three years at the University of Virginia as a performance analyst and coach, also coaching at a youth academy in Charlottesville, specializing in goalkeeper development. Carlon can be contacted through his LinkedIn account, or via Twitter.
A request (for the analysts)
We understand that the analytics community is constantly improving the ideas of others, and this work would not be possible without taking bits of the collective ideas of the soccer analytics community at large. Where direct attribution can be provided, we have tried to do so.
In the universe of hundreds of articles on soccer/football, it is impossible to read every bit of research that has been made on the topic of goals. If this work duplicates any existing work, please contact the author to either have a change made or proper credit given.
