Sean Dyche And Everton’s Expected Goals For The 23/24 Premier League

“The xG is right up there,” said Sean Dyche following Everton’s 2-1 defeat at home to newly-promoted relegation favorite Luton Town last week.

The Everton manager’s mention of xG [expected goals] was met with responses varying from celebration to contempt.

After losing to the team predicted to be the Premier
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League’s worst in the 2023/24 season, it was difficult to convince sceptics with talk of xG.

“You don’t examine a whole performance on xG [expected goals],” added Dyche. “But it’s another marker, it gives you an idea.

“Bodies in the box, balls going in the box, quality chances created, but you’ve got to take them at the end of the day.”

It is a marriage between what might be considered more traditional, old-school football, and modern football analytics, though it is not a new partnership.

Sam Allardyce, often derided as being an old-school, pragmatic soccer manager, was a pioneer in the use of data in the Premier League.

This was especially the case at his overperforming Bolton Wanderers side of the 2000s, where he drew on his experiences of the way data was used in American sports—the NFL in particular—from his time with the Tampa Bay Rowdies.

During his ten years as manager of Burnley, Dyche himself was using a combination of newer out-of-possession trends, and more familiar and traditional narrow, low defending, depending on the phase of the game.

Dyche’s mention of xG after losing at home to a team widely tipped to finish bottom of the league was met with a range of responses from hope to scepticism to derision.

The Everton manager himself has been sceptical as to its use, but its reflection of how well he believes his team has been playing, despite not getting the results, appears to have convinced him.

“One of our analysts said our xG, which I’m not that big a believer in but it’s still a reference point, was around three, which is high in the Premier League,” Dyche said after the opening game of the season at home to Fulham, which ended in a 1-0 defeat.

“Inevitably, it’s only a measure but we’ve got to look at where we were and where we are now, and that, I thought, was a big shift.”

As alluded to by Dyche in his mentions of the metric, xG is an indicator of the quality of chances created and by extension the likelihood of a chance, i.e. a shot taken, resulting in a goal. A chance with a higher xG number would more likely be expected to result in a goal.

For a guide, the xG of a penalty is considered to be between 0.75 and 0.79 depending on the xG algorithm and data provider, and a “big chance” can be anything above 0.30.

Opta’s definition of a big chance does not mention xG, but shots with an xG value over 0.30 are usually considered big chances.

Everton (and Chelsea for that matter) is finding out that the xG gods do not remain dormant for long.

Dyche’s team cashed in on the xG with a 3-0 win at home to Bournemouth this past weekend, breaking the previous habit of creating chances but not scoring them.

“A dominant performance, and at last the xG pays us back,” Dyche told the BBC after the game.

“I’ve been going on about that, but the more statistically you do those things, they will happen”

The xG racked up in this 3-0 win (2.4, per FBref) was slightly lower than it was in the loss to Luton (2.9) which was Everton’s highest xG tally of the season so far.

The second highest came in that opening-day loss to Fulham at home when Everton failed to score despite an xG of 2.7.

“It was another dominant performance and equally it’s fair to speak about xG when you win [as when you lose],” Dyche told the written media in his post-Bournemouth press conference.

“Twenty-five efforts today, 23 in the last game, xG of like three plus [which it was according to some providers, such as Understat].

“The xG is as high as it’s been in the last eight years here, I think.

“The signs have been there but now you’ve got to capitalise on it.

“You can’t just keep waiting for it to happen and today we didn’t wait for it to happen. We made it happen and that’s got to be a mindset that continues.”

Everton’s expected goals difference, per FBref via Opta, is the sixth-best in the league at +4.5.

This puts them above more lauded teams like Brighton & Hove Albion, West Ham United, and table-toppers Tottenham Hotspur for this metric.

Dyche’s mentions of xG are much more palatable to the naysayers after a win, especially one as convincing as that 3-0 scoreline against Bournemouth.

Everton’s expected goal this season is to remain in the Premier League, but its expected goals, or xG, at this stage suggests it might have a bit more in store than merely a relegation scrap.