As Santi Cazorla this past week, once again, went under the knife to fix a relapse in his achilles injury, any remaining Gooner hopes of a late season title challenge were crushed. In contrast, Chelsea’s fortunes soared on Saturday with another seemingly routine win over Swansea. To be honest they could have been on the backfoot if Swansea was awarded a fairly obvious penalty midway the second-half but the PGMO decided otherwise. It is now fair to say that, barring a Liverpool-like implosion, they will win the 2016-17 premier league (PL) title. Despite my red tinted lens, that possibility does not even register on my telescope. As matters now stand City, Spurs, Arsenal, United and Liverpool are in a desperate battle for the other top-3 positions which will grant entry into the Champion’s League.
Despite my early optimism, especially after the club overcame a bad start and went on a 14 game unbeaten streak between August 20th and December 10th last year, amassing 33 points or a 2.35 points per game (ppg), I was less confident after Santi Cazorla pulled up lame at Ludogorets in the Champions League fixture and was ruled out of the following PL game with Middlesborough on October 22nd. Initially the club seem to manage well without the little midfield maestro, scraping draws with United and Spurs and banging West Ham 5-1 last November, but that was only flattering to deceive. The unbiased data always speaks the cold, hard truth. Seventeen (17) games in the PL without Santi and the ppg has fallen to 1.76, a mind-blowing 25% drop. Most striking, Arsenal was 1st place in the league Arsenal on October 20th, and today the club is battling for 4th with City.
In spite of the power and clarity of the data, we continue to have fake news or better yet fake analysis by pseudo experts in the mainstream media, blogs and podcasts pouring blame on Arsene Wenger for the recent run of bad results especially the heavy defeat to Bayern Munich in the Champions League. But at last there are a few in the mainstream media who now acknowledge what I have blogged on at least three (3) occasions over the past year, Santi Cazorla is the key to Arsenal and he is virtually irreplaceable.
First, on October 24, 2016 the Telegraph’s Charlie Eccleshare did a piece which had as its headline:
“Arsenal’s draw with Middlesbrough underlines why Santi Cazorla is the player Arsene Wenger cannot do without”
Later on December 2nd a follow-up by Eccleshare was published with another bold header:
“Santi Cazorla injury will derail Arsenal’s season – unless Arsene Wenger does something drastic”
Well the data is in and Arsenal’s season is badly off the tracks. Even though the Guardian’s Barney Ronay flowery language is often aimed at the literary cognoscenti, he was straight to the point:
“With Cazorla in the centre Arsenal are a different team. Mainly they’re a better one, his presence above all defensive and stabilising, a leadership role. This season Cazorla has started 10 games, with eight wins and two draws. Arsenal have kept five clean sheets with him in the team, compared with four in 20 League and Champions League games since his injury. In the last five years Arsenal have beaten Chelsea, Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool and Tottenham just once without their most resilient ball-hog in the team.”
It is noteworthy that Ronay identifies and recognizes something that many of us at Positively Arsenal, especially our friend When We Were Boring, have emphasized. Santi is the technical leader of this team. None of this abstract, data-free nonsense that the current team and players lack guts, which is simply the reactionary shibboleths of a past era when apparently Nobby Styles was the proof of leadership by emerging from games bloodied and toothless as if he had been in a 15 round boxing brawl (Readers who don’t know of Nobby, should Bing him up).
For those who so easily forget what Santi brings to the table in big games like Bayern, turn your minds to three-four months ago in Arsenal’s champion’s league game away to PSG. In the words of Ronay:
“Just as it is unlikely any English team will see a better all-round performance this season than Cazorla’s outflanking of that powerful Paris Saint-Germain midfield in the second half in Paris last September, scuttling about, holding the ball in tiny spaces and driving the game back Arsenal’s way like a plucky little snowspeeder patiently winding its guy rope around the legs of the imperial walkers.”
I quote these well published journos simply to affirm what I seem unable to sufficiently convey via the data; Santi is the key to the Arsenal way of playing and, at least for now, is irreplaceable. To the contrary, some of my friends at PA urge and I paraphrase: “Stop belabouring the point, Shotta, we have other midfielders who can compensate.”
Can they truly compensate? Recently I did an analysis of the season-to-date Squawka PL performance data of all the Arsenal midfielders and it was a revelation. To make it easy for mobile devices I will break the table in 2 parts.
Top-4 Avg Performance Score
| Ozil | Cazorla | Iwobi | The Ox | |
| Avg Performance Score | 27 | 25 | 22 | 18 |
| Total Appearances | 22 | 8 | 21 | 21 |
| Shot Accuracy | 50% | 67% | 47% | 43% |
| Avg. Pass Accuracy | 87% | 91% | 87% | 82% |
| Avg. Pass Length | 15m | 16m | 14m | 17m |
| Avg. Chances Created | 2.68 | 1.25 | 1.14 | 1.10 |
| Avg. Goals Scored | 0.23 | 0.25 | 0.14 | 0.10 |
| Avg. Defensive Actions | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| Avg. Duels Won | 53% | 28% | 55% | 53% |
Bottom-4 Avg Performance Score
| Xhaka | Elneny | Coquelin | Ramsey | |
| Avg Performance Score | 18 | 16 | 16 | 11 |
| Total Appearances | 19 | 12 | 21 | 12 |
| Shot Accuracy | 23% | 0% | 14% | 29% |
| Avg. Pass Accuracy | 89% | 92% | 88% | 90% |
| Avg. Pass Length | 18m | 16m | 15m | 16m |
| Avg. Chances Created | 0.84 | 0.25 | 0.62 | 0.83 |
| Avg. Goals Scored | 0.05 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Avg. Defensive Actions | 3 | 1 | 4 | 1 |
| Avg. Duels Won | 45% | 42% | 48% | 52% |
I have already made the point in my last blog that Cazorla is our second best midfielder next to Ozil and is inferior in only one offensive statistic i.e. Chances Created, making him a huge loss as an attacker. In his absence the team is forced to rely Iwobi and Oxlade-Chamberlain as Attacking Midfielders. While Arsenal fans should be extremely happy with the development of both players, the stubborn fact is that at 87% and 82% Pass Completion respectively as well as inferior chance creation stats it is hardly likely they will trouble defenders in much the same way as Santi. Nevertheless they are young players with a high upside and in Arsene they have a manager who is infinitely capable of bringing the best out of them. The bottom-line is neither is really suited for a deep lying role thus the manager is relying on Xhaka, Elneny and Coquelin and Ramsey to perform this function. The fact that they as well as The Ox have sub 20 average performance scores is a telling statistic. Even more troubling is the most experienced in the lot is Aaron Ramsey, but he has had an injury plagued season and his average performance score is a measly 11. The data is compelling; Arsene may have 6 injury-free midfielders but he is starved of another quality attacking central midfielder. (Note to StatDNA and the scouts in planning for the 2017 transfer season.)
I am no tactical expert and I have no advice to give the manager. He, I am sure, is more aware than all of us of the scale of the challenge he faces and the experience to prevail. For example on February 7, 2015, Arsenal lost to Tottenham 2-1 and fell to 6th place in the league with only 42 points. In the next 14 matches the club went on a run of 10 wins, three draws and one loss to finish 3rd at 75 points. Switching Santi to that deeper role, in place of the injured Mikel Arteta, was the key to that revival. Surely Arsene will find another internal solution.
Positively Arsenal 
–
Ian
Do you know if there are any more u23 matches to be played in n5 this season, is the move to the new ground next year?
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I don’t know how Wenger keeps going either, Mandy. Sadly enough, I would be inclined to support the Wenger Out Brigade if they were to say: “The Arsenal will never be successful all the time that the refs refuse to apply the rules evenly and appropriately to thier matches – and they are unlikely to do that all the time that the pundits keep up their relentless pressure on Wenger and his team. Therefore I would like a change of manager to see if that would bring about greater fairness.” That they seem unable to see that this is happening suggests that either I am not seeing the matches properly, or that they don’t bother watching at all, or are intellectually challenged, or maybe too inebriated to know or care.
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Think they might be a few of those things FH.
But as long as Wenger is at the club, he continues to play the brand of football he attempts to, an Arsenal exec who sits on various governing bodies appears to remain silent, The PGMOL remains secretive, unaccountable, and with far too few refs, technology is not properly used, Mike Riley is in post, and the various bodies rabidly supported by the media insist on keeping English football in the dark ages………..well, we already know what Arsenal will face
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Sorry shotta but as a mathematician and Engineer, I must say here that your obsession with data is bordering on the religious. Data is nothing but history in numbers. No more, no less.
I believe that data is important for planning and other nice things but your believe that it is all in all is – forgive me here – stupid. No disrespect.
I am with Ian 100%.
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well foreverheady did you see footage our so unbiased media in the wembley press box yesterday jumping, clapping and cheering the utd winner. It tells us all we need to know about why they write the slanted stuff the do.
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isn’t it rather odd that so many of the loud mouth WOB are so keen on having David Dein back at the club, the same David Dein, that if in control at the club would not be offering Wenger a two year deal, but a five or ten year deal.
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I couldn’t bring myself to watch, Eduardo – but I did hear someone (Pearce maybe) explaining that a yellow card for a United player, although soft was probably correct as he made a tackle from behind. Which puzzled me a lot, as I see lots of those tackles made on Arsenal players which are never blown up, let alone carded. In my view it is why we are not unlucky with injuries – rather we are inevitably hampered by injuries because of the refusal of the refs to apply the rules.
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Fins, as far I’m aware only the city game will be at emirates unless their is a rearranged game they switch later.
As far as a fans area at Conley is concerned I don’t think that will happen soon. I know the ladies wanted it but the youth coaches were sceptical.
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I quite like data, but not too much.
The difficulty with data is one of differentiation, and of relevance.
Discrimination in the sense of in choosing to extract and assemble the data I have, and formed my conclusion from it, have I differentiated between what is a coincidental pattern or sequence of events i.e. these random evens happen, or that there is a provable causal relationship i.e. A + B = C.
Now we all agree that Santi is a very good, important player. And we can all see the data that Shotta has assembled and the conclusions we all can understand.
However – there is always a however – if Santi is the THE KEY – to understanding Arsenal’s success or failure then how consistent is that conclusion with other data ?
For a simple example Santi has been with AFC since 2012/2013 and in the opening three years of his career in red he played 40+ games every season including 30+ PL games every year. Good man Santi.
Yet of our league finishes out best result last season, 2nd, when Santi was injured and played just 15 PL games.
The arguable conclusion of that sequence is that Santi’s participation is a negative factor in our PL position. The more the Spaniard plays, the less well we do.
I don’t think that and I doubt anyone else does, but in terms of strict data ( A+B=C) the conclusion is, as Shotta might say, “indisputable”.
The second, and bigger question, is relevance and IF I HAVE collected, or am able to collect all the data I need to come to a conclusion? Now that is the big problem with football, and trying to impose a statistical, “countable” mesh over what is a highly complex and unpredictable pattern of human activity, with physics, chemistry, psychology, et cetera et cetera. Billions and billions of factors interact even in one 90 minute game.
I don’t think we have the real statistical tools to impose that rigour with football.
In the meantime, and until we do I shall use data to illuminate my view, rather than as a support for my conclusions.
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Bravo anicoll5,
BRAVO!!!
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Test
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Good Afternoon, all.
Anicoll, that Is an interesting comment @ 11:59 and highlights some of the variations between data collection and analysis which can unintentionally skew conclusions if there is a systematic error in the collection of the data.
Shotta puts a lot of work into his ‘data Posts’ and credit is due to him for that, as it is not everyone’s cup of tea.
I use financial data to guide me in my work, and not to confirm my predictive conclusions, which are otherwise known as ‘confirmation bias’, because altho the phrase ‘data is unbiased’ is frequently used, that is not really correct.
Some of the accepted data errors that can unintentionally occur would include cherry picking, insufficient data samples, or assessment bias, and altho of course Shotta would strive to avoid any such thing, without peer group oversight these can happen.
As you have said, Anicoll, football is a particularly difficult subject for analytical data models, as so much of the participatory data is subjective rather than objective as it is based on the experiences of the individuals involved – the fans.
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Francis Coquelin shared a Squawka stat on Facebook showing that he has completed more final 3rd passes this season than any other player in Europe:
Coquelin – 298
Alli – 285
Vidal – 220
Veratti – 216
Kroos – 201
I love Francis Coquelin as much as I love any Arsenal player, past or present BUT what does this stat tell us about the player and the others on the list? My short answer is absolutely nothing other than a bragging right for the player leading it. Little wonder he enthusiastically shared it.
Stats/data are important but they are not the all in all and should be used with a lot of caveats and extreme caution.
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Our youth coach, Jonkers will be joining Wolfsburg – now confirmed….can only wish him well.
An opportunity for Freddie….or too early in his coaching career?
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I doff my cap Henry to Shotta for having the patience to gather and assemble the data, and attempt to impose order on the chaos. I’d be a fool to think I’d be any worse off in absorbing it. However I am a shocking relativist, I cannot help myself.
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I believe this debate is one of the most interesting in the sport today and is reflected in the “banter” at a club like AFC between the coaches (e.g. Grimandi) & the Stats DNA crew.
It is also worth considering:
a) that football is a numbers game.
Goals. Points. Etc.
b) that officials are assessed and judged by their peers using standard templates and methods, therefore any efforts to undermine statistical reviews of refs using those very metrics/methods are a waste of everyone’s time!
c) stats don’t tell us everything in other sports, e.g. Cricket, but they can come damn close!
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Shotta, my points weren’t disputing the data that we are more effective when Santi has been in the side. However the data cannot tell you why that historically has happened. Like Andy said you can’t assume just because we have won more games in the past that’s totally down to one factor. In fact when analysing data you take into account as many different contributing factors as possible. Have you considered a fit Santi could have lost form and seen his pts per game average drop. I may not have understood fully but are all these games when Santi played a full game and in the centre of midfield otherwise the conclusion once again could be skewed.
The Pires/ Freddie analogy was trying to point out that solutions are not always like for like, the team dynamic sometimes has to change on occasion the loss of one player can be rectified by the inclusion of two different players.
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Thanks Ian
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According to the news Mandy Freddie L. will be in Wolfsburg too.
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Dear all.
Santi has been the “key” since he moved to the deeper role , vacated by our other “key” man Mikel Arteta.
So, any comparison of points per game before that time is imo redundant.Although we finished 2nd last season, the reality is that when Santi was playing, we were first(or there abouts). The same as this season.
We won games without Dennis, we won them without Henry , but I would suggest I don’t need stats to tell me the chances of winning were better with them. Just like Santi now and Mikel before him, He is, until we find a replacement, the very heartbeat of the team. The main man, the boss, ,The end.
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There you all go:
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/sport/2017/02/so-much-table-never-lies-data-unravels-footballs-biggest-lie-all
Some would describe the above as similar to the AFC austerity model (’06-’13)
A numbers game.
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Oh well, there goes the Freddie theory….good luck to him as well if thats the case.
Pires…. anyone?
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The importance of Santi to Arsenal since his arrival in 2013 cannot be overstated. I agree with shotta’s articles in principle but I find his “data answers all of life’s mysteries” position unacceptable. The team misses Santi like crazy but we must still interpret his highly impressive stats with some nuance and caution and not read into them like they are divine commandments cast in stone.
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finsbury,
That was a good read. Thanks for sharing.
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http://babagrumpy.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/lessons-from-umpteenth-ranieri-sacking.html …
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i dont follow stats. i follow my heart, my eyes and that is why i follow arsenal. like wenger always say, it is wrong to single any player out for praise in a team sport as it is also wrong to put the failure of a team on a single player. if we select by stats players in every single position in a league, i’m not very certain that such combination can win a championship. like pick a goalkeeper by number of clean sheet, full back by number overlaping runs, defenders by clearances and midfielders by number of completed passes while strikers by number of goals? we end up with strange bed fellows. to me it is plain stupid this stats.
the best spell arteta had in the middle for arsenal as far as i recollect were when he was paired with ramsey and i cant really recall great performance of cazorla in a big game without coq by his side. but if coq and xhaka dont make a great pairing, does that mean coq is the bad player? (ofcourse he is because of the inferior price tag) and the fact that ramsey and cazorla dont do well together, does that negate the good record of arteta and ramsey in the middle?
ofcourse i dont have stats to back up my claims but i trust my eyes and my heart. twice this season coq have been rushed back from injuries whenever there is crisis in the midfield due to suspension and non availability of some players but it is this same coq that will be single out for blame not those player that are fit but suspended. i just think coq is not being faily treated.
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Boo your welcome.
For me this is an interesting debate, and after a lifetime of following cricket stats wnd with the increased computing power available today it is only a matter of time before we get very close to such technology being accurate and more useful not just in football, but when driving your driverless car around town.
I’ve seen George Lucas’ THX hehe ( great great movie!), the first or best dream of a driverless car on the silver screen. And everyone knows and understands, since the sixties at least, that such powerful computational power is not everything. Who can forget the scene with Robert Duvall confessing to a computer/database?
But the data crunching going to play a very important role in most trades!
Always has, always will.
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Boo, the link was thanks to Pat who comments on Untold
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This interesting, and I applaud the effort. It’s probably not a coincidence that 7AM Kickoff published a piece on the same topic today.
I would caution us not to draw too many definitive conclusions from sample sizes of eight and 17 matches, or even the totals from this season and last with and without Santi. Those are just not large enough samples for statistical significance–though the stats together with our observations can lead to a reasonable conclusion that we are not as fluid without Santi. There is no doubt in my mind that the manager sees this more clearly than we do.
On a point purely about the entertainment value of this piece, I laughed out loud when you (rightly) criticized Barney Ronay for appealing to the literary cognoscenti then in the next paragraph attacked “reactionary shibboleths.”
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Jonker named head coach at Wolfsburg
We would like to wish our academy manager Andries Jonker every success following his appointment as head coach at Bundesliga side VFL Wolfsburg.
Andries has helped to guide the transformation of our academy over the past three seasons. Significant progress has been made in developing our infrastructure and our Hale End academy has undergone a complete rebuild, creating a modern facility designed to give our young players the best possible place to develop.
Andries joined us in July 2014 after serving as assistant manager at Wolfsburg. He previously spent seven years developing and implementing youth coaching reforms for the KNVB (Dutch FA) and worked as assistant coach to Louis van Gaal at Barcelona and Bayern Munich, where he later had a spell as interim head coach.
Our chief executive Ivan Gazidis said: “This is a great opportunity for Andries and we wish him every future success. Under Andries’ guidance, we have made huge progress in our academy operations.
“Arsenal is known around the world for its development of young players and we are confident we will find the right person to continue to lead our progress.”
Commenting on his move, Andries said: “I have had a wonderful three years at Arsenal. We have made significant progress and it has been great to be part of a club which puts such an emphasis on developing young players through its academy.
“I leave a great team of people who will continue to do a terrific job and I would like to thank everyone, including the board, chief executive Ivan Gazidis and Arsène Wenger for all the support.
“There are some top young players in the Arsenal academy. I look forward to seeing them progress their careers.”
Copyright 2017 The Arsenal Football Club plc. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to http://www.arsenal.com as the source
Read more at http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/20170227/jonker-named-head-coach-at-wolfsburg#ccIgLMEDPHZEmjvV.99
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Freddie Ljunberg confirmed as part of Jonker’s Wolfsberg coaching team
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VivaFootballCalcio@Vivafootcalcio 7h7 hours ago
Crystal Palace fans caused £40,000 worth of damage to their own club coach on Saturday thinking it was Middlesbrough’s. Idiots! 😂
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https://mobile.twitter.com/ArsenalFC_fl/status/836232049270878208/video/1
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A well rested Liverpool, purring on their thumping of Spurs in the last game, flattened at crisis stricken managerless Leicester.
I think that covers every cliche, not to mention the random outcome of 22 blokes kicking a ball about for money.
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I am sure the UK media will demonstrate their lack of bias, and lay into Liverpool and Klopp as they would Arsenal and Wenger if they perform like that
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#KloppOUT @KloppMustGo 13m13 minutes ago
There will be a #KloppOUT march before the Arsenal game on Saturday. Flags & banners welcome, lets show FSG we want change!
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Mirror FootballVerified account @MirrorFootball 1h1 hour ago
Chinese Super League’s £30m-a-year offer to make Arsenal’s Arsene Wenger the highest-paid boss in football #AFC http://bit.ly/2m4ozyL
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So sure was I of the outcome of that game, Andy, that I had not even bothered to check the score, so thanks for that lovely surprise right here at the end of my workday. Just goes to show “past performance is no guarantee of future results”, I guess. Random, indeed.
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2017/02/27/arsene-wenger-turns-30m-year-record-offer-manage-china-opts/
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I see in an interview with the Liverpool Echo, Arsenal Supporters Trust’s Nigel Phillips has admitted that AST has talks with the now Everton major shareholder Farhad Moshiri, when he was part of Red & White Holdings with Usmanov, but AST was cast aside by R&W once their usefulness was gone
Nigel Phillips “We had dialogue with Farhad (and Red and White Holdings) when they needed us but when they didn’t we became less relevant”
so they have finally admitted what many of us always knew, AST were in league with R&W, it was so obvious with their coordinated attack of all things Arsenal in the media.
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I see with Jonker gone, the media are throwing out names as to who might be his replacement as head of the Arsenal Academy.
ex Rangers manager Mark Warburthon, Barcelona youth coach Pep Segura, and former Arsenal players Dennis Bergkamp and Stephen Morrow are mentioned, Morrow is currently Arsenal’s head of youth recruitment.
A name I would think might be under consideration is David O’Leary, he has of late been a guest of the Arsenal board at all our recent games. there might be a role for him of some kind at the club, Academy or even on the Board. Of course he might just remain a guest of the board at games.
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The WOB really have their knickers in a twist tonight, with media reports that not only has Wenger been offered a new two year deal, but that the deal would mean a 25%, or £2M increase on his current wages of £8M a year.
The WOB really don’t like it when those running the club show by their actions that they couldn’t care less for their opinions. We really do have some very smart men on our board.
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blud fam innit
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Just hope the board, and our finish to the season can persuade him Ed
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afcstuff @afcstuff 34m34 minutes ago
Aaron Ramsey: “Everyone’s entitled to their opinion but I know what Arsène Wenger has done for this club has been surreal. The amount of success & the teams that he’s built over the years has been absolutely fantastic. He’s done an amazing job, for me personally, for the team, for the club & I’m happy to have him as my manager.”
Ramsey on if Wenger should stay at Arsenal beyond this season: “Of course, I think all the players believe in him. We owe him a lot. We have let him [Wenger] down at times but we’re determined to put things right & finish off the season strongly. We still have a few things to play for. We have a lot of games to play in the Premiership & we’re in the FA Cup as well. The Bayern game – we know it’s going to be tough but it’s still not over. Stranger things have happened in football before. We have to believe. There’s still a lot of football to be played & we’ll be fighting for every minute on that pitch.”
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I’ve been an Arsenal fan all my life (over 50 years) and I have been lucky enough to see us win
6 of our 13 league titles – 1970–71, 1988–89, 1990–91, 1997–98, 2001–02, 2003–04
9 of our 12 FA Cups – 1970–71, 1978–79, 1992–93, 1997–98, 2001–02, 2002–03,
2004–05, 2013–14, 2014–15
our two league cups – 1986–87, 1992–93
our only European Cup Winners Cup – 1993–94
our only Inter Cities Fairs Cup – 1969–70
that is 19 major trophies won
and I can add
7 of our 14 Charity/Community Shields – 1991, 1998, 1999, 2002, 2004, 2014, 2015
I’ve seen us win 3 League and FAC doubles, and a domestic cup double too.
I have seen us lose quite a few cup finals too, 5 league cup finals for a start, 4 European finals including our only CL final, (2 ECWC and a UEFA Cup final) and 4 FA Cups, and I’ve seen us finish 2nd in the league 7 times.
that is 13 cup finals and 7 leagues.
I’ve seen us finish 16th and only 4pts above relegation in 1975 and finish 17th in 1976 and 6pts off relegation, both seasons seen us win only 13 of our 42 league games, with 18 and 19 defeats respectively. But I’ve also seen us go a league season unbeaten, and a run of 49 league games unbeaten.
And that is why I will never let anyone tell me I should be ashamed of Arsenal, or that I should want my Arsenal back, and I will never accept that anyone can laugh at Arsenal.
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I could do with a link to this Liverpool Echo article.
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Eduardo you are an old git like me
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“I see in an interview with the Liverpool Echo, Arsenal Supporters Trust’s Nigel Phillips has admitted that AST had talks with the now Everton major shareholder Farhad Moshiri,”
NP – “Do you want large fries with that?”
FM – ” No thanks”
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