Stephen
@SRFootball_
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football analysis academic | currently MMU & MUFC | views my own
Manchester
Joined February 2020
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Pinned Tweet
Some exciting news 🥰
I’ve accepted an offer to start my PhD with Manchester Metropolitan University and Manchester United next month to analyse the development of a performance analysis game model and performance indicators in elite sport ⚽️
Really excited to get started!!
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McGregor's role v Rangers (and how tightly they stuck to him) was a point of discussion between
@Jon_Mackenzie
and I during Tactics Club 🥰
👀 Watch here how by *not* shaking his marker, he helps progress the ball and sets himself to support the next phase 👇
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Aberdeen v Hibs - 4th v 3rd in the league - kicks off shortly but isn’t available to watch on Sky. If you aren’t in attendance, you’d have to sign up to Aberdeen’s PPV and pay £13.99 on top of your Sky sub
If you were arguing for this TV deal, I don’t know what to say lmao
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📝 Anti-Pragmatism: How Ange Postecoglou Steered Into The Skid
•What changed?
•Counterpressing
•Sacrificing the wing
•The Ralston dilemma
•Option-oriented pressing
•Finding a solution
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No Europe left for us, peak age, and - for all his in-box strengths - not perfect for the system. Selling GG now and bringing in someone younger with a more suited skillset for less is how smart clubs do business 🤷♀️
Lack of forward thinking in this regard has cost us before
🧵
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Think this is a good indication of what happened to Celtic under NL
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🚨 Relationist Pegs in Positionist Holes: why Bernabei is already a complete player 🚨
This longform analysis discusses why it's unfair to critique Bernabei's positioning in this system, and what should be considered for his future 🤔
Enjoy!!
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it’s so easy when chances aren’t being created en masse to get frustrated with mids/fwds but - as Marcelo Bielsa has been quoted saying & evidenced by the nature of tactical tweaks at elite level - the first place to check with issues like this is centre backs
so an issue with Celtic’s CBs atm is passing directly to each other instead of slightly in front. i don’t have the time atm to draw up something proper to illustrate so here’s some whatsapp analysis lmao
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wasn't going to do anything for tonight, but McGregor and Hatate were SO impressive I couldn't resist. quick, sharp passes from the centre helped pull Madrid in & give our wingers chances in 1v1s
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Is Jesse Marsch genuinely interested? Probably not.
Should we chase him still? Absolutely.
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One of the most important things that modern clubs like Salzburg and Ajax understand and we don’t is that there’s no room for sentimentality in football. As a club and fan base, we’re really poor in that regard
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Not on my laptop so excuse the quality but this is brutal
Issue 2
We’re painfully spread in defensive transitions.
This increases the likelihood of individual error. When a player has a bigger area to cover, it takes a better defender to effectively cover the space. We’ve seen how weak our midfield is defensively player by player.
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very briefly interrupting my twitter hiatus to share this week's special edition newsletter - video here & discussion in the link. enjoy!
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TW: transphobia, death
Transphobic flyers being handed out outside Celtic Park again. Just after Brianna Ghey’s murder, too? Are you fucking kidding me? If it wasn’t already clear what their end goal was… I’m so distraught, and so fucking angry.
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🎦⬇️
So... O'Riley's low build up v St. Johnstone - a 🧵 of videos
Firstly, here is McGregor consistently orienting himself between the opposition STs, and how that unlocks space 🔑🔓
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Been trying to think of the most succinct way to say this all day:
Data is good - it tells us things
Data is limited - it doesn’t tell us everything
Esp at micro level, context & qual analysis is critical
Rejecting data is poor analysis, but so is over-reliance
🧵
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Alexa play Only Love Can Hurt Like This
'We got him!' 🤗
De Amerikaanse international Mark McKenzie is onze tweede wintertransfer. Hij komt over van Philadelphia Union. 💙 🇺🇸
👉
#krcgenk
#mijnploeg
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so an issue with Celtic’s CBs atm is passing directly to each other instead of slightly in front. i don’t have the time atm to draw up something proper to illustrate so here’s some whatsapp analysis lmao
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I try to keep this account to just football but this is too much
It’s disgusting how open/commonplace transphobia is generally, but this (& the replies agreeing) sum up the Tory party: a group built on hate
Hate will not win. Tories & transphobes are not welcome here 🏳️⚧️
Interviewer: "is a trans woman a woman?"
Liz Truss: "no"
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Seen a lot of chat about Celtic’s finishing, which is unfair after how we started this season 🔥
Variance & regression are the biggest culprits, rather than our players suddenly becoming bad at a key skill 📈📉
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Lost a follower immediately after RTing this so I’d just like to make it explicitly clear that this is a safe space for trans people, human rights are not up for debate, and if you disagree with this sentiment in the slightest please also fuck off :)
🏳️⚧️❤️
The resilience of trans people in the face of endless marginalisation is an inspiration to us all.
This
#TransAwarenessWeek
, let’s empower trans communities in their struggle for justice, and celebrate their strength and joy.
There is no debate: trans rights are human rights.
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The idea that Rodgers has worse players than Ange had is fun when you remember the state of the squad post-Lennon. Ange played DT and Rogic as 8s in a high tempo press, and then the squad was built over time. That summer, we’d resigned to years of rebuilding it was so bad 💀
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🚨 Expected Points (Stephen’s Version) 🚨
The Scottish Premiership is back this weekend, and so are xPoints!
For this coverage (and more 👀) you can subscribe to my FREE newsletter:
These visuals will also be posted on this account for every match 📊
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GIF Alert 🚨
It's that time again 👀
@TheCynicWolf
@aconnolly91
and myself recorded the Team Talk for the
@90MinuteCynic
to mirror the opposition analysis Celtic will conduct vs Milan (available on ). Additionally, here are some GIFs to support!
Thread.
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A pattern:
We predict how a team will play.
Team plays that way.
We clearly have not prepared for team playing that way.
Rangers haven't done anything different or clever here. They have played exactly how we were expecting.
They've cruised out.
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so… it’s after around game 10 that signal starts to separate from noise. Celtic/Rangers now each played 11 (also conveniently meaning they’ve played everyone once)
points gap maybe flattering slightly so far…
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Unfortunately this is my last season with
@90MinuteCynic
🥲 very thankful for everything over the past 3 years 💚 and thankful to everyone who put up with my constant Taylor Swift references 🫶
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Banning the GB for showing support for Palestine is disgusting
@CelticFC
Happy to profit from the group’s/club’s image as injustice-fighters when it suits, but not happy to stand by it when it counts
Solidarity isn’t an aesthetic, fuck off Celtic & Free Palestine 🇵🇸
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🚨 Scottish Premiership: Average Shot Distance 🚨
Measured from the location of the shot to the centre of the goal in metres, here are the average (mean) shot distances of each team in the league so far 👇
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@Harrison101HD
@GraceOnFootball
I think his conversion rate was/is pretty much dead in line with average - small distinction but I think it’s more that it’s the one offensive part of his game that isn’t totally exceptional rather than being below average
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In this week's update, I delve a little into how Rangers' midfield selection allowed Celtic to overcome their past issues playing through Rangers' press (as well as the usual good stuff throughout the league!)👇
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🍀 Today, against Aberdeen:
⚽️ Reo Hatate created the most positive xT (0.89)
🔑 Matt O'Riley received the most positive xT (0.60)
🤝 0.43 of this came from Hatate ➡️ O'Riley passes
What a pair 🔥
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Let's talk about their rotations first. Milan's forwards are very talented in pulling their man in and moving them to create space. They're in tune with each other and notice the cues well that indicate the start of a rotation.
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Way this is framed is embarrassing imo. You can pay through the roof for every different provider available and STILL not get even close to every game for a team. Blaming fans for the inaccessibility of football is an odd way to present this article; is football not for fans?
🧵
📺 Estimated 17m Europeans aged 16-74 viewed illegal content in 2021, costing sport, music and entertainment £3bn
📺 Illegal streaming is "real threat" in English football
📺 Premier League and EFL fighting back
📺 Police visiting 1,000 homes in crackdown
📝
@PJBuckingham
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Looks good obviously but a Celtic FB should be putting up these kind of numbers compared to the rest of the league. Detriment to the system compared to JJ still huge
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🚨 Derby Day Special!! 🚨
The way the derby played out w.r.t Celtic's build up got me thinking about how Ange implements his interpretation of Juego de Posición
⚽️ are CBs used effectively?
⚽️ could 'inverted' CBs be a novel solution?
⚽️ what next?
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Our defensive problems are an advert for DoF btw. This is why you can’t let a manager spend a fortune on one system and then change his mind as he feels like it. 2 loan FBs starting, both nowhere near good enough
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Would be really excited to have Berg as part of our rebuild 👀
🚨Who is Patrick Berg and what would he bring to Celtic?
🎯Our Analysis Team of
@TheCynicWolf
and
@SRFootball_
took a look at him for our Scouting Report podcast back in January.
Available ➡️
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Blew our shot at McKenzie for Duffy...
Philadelphia Union sporting director Ernst Tanner has told
@SkySportsNews
that Celtic face stiff competition from the Premier League and Bundesliga for centre-back Mark McKenzie.
They were in talks in the summer but Celtic opted to sign Shane Duffy on loan from Brighton.
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I mean you *can* sack a manager with each underperformance but, like, you shouldn’t
@HibernianFC
.
Performances had dropped off under Maloney compared with Ross (1.3/1.7 xPts per match), but both underperformed (1.0/1.2) Pts per match) & would’ve likely improved with time.
(1/3)
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Really struggling for the words today. All the arseholes pedalling TERF shite have created an environment where Brianna & the trans community can be targeted. Support for anti trans actors has caused this. Every trans-erasing sentiment has caused this.
Brianna deserved better.
I told you. British Media, The Government, JK Rowling, Ricky Gervais, and the whole hideous, stinking Gender Critical movement have blood on their hands. “A targeted attack.” You have created a hysterical climate where it’s ok to target trans people. God bless Brianna ❤️
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Celtic play St. Mirren on Sunday... so where are St. Mirren conceding chances? 👀
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Thinking about the pathway into analysis. Advice I got starting out was following/talking to the right people & reading
@spielvercom
(good advice!)
Been on courses over the years that weren’t great
Interested in everyone else’s pathway - how did you learn more about analysis?
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there is no such thing as apolitical; refusal to engage is a political move in favour of the status quo. the statement made by
@CelticFC
backs the oppression of Palestine. horrible.
#FreePalestine
🇵🇸
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The last update before the World Cup!!
I talk a lot about County's man marking and Rangers' midfield this week 🤔
As well as all the usual stats nonsense 🤓
Subscribe for your Scottish Premiership fix through the season if you enjoy 🥰
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I had the most fun recording this, it was so interesting to work on this as a research project so really great to get to discuss that with Jon!
It also includes the intersection of Jon and I’s interests: a Hegelian critique of rest defence shape notations
🎙️ Why is everyone talking about rest defence?
@Jon_Mackenzie
is joined by
@SRFootball_
to discuss the most important aspects of rest defence.
But first, what is Rest Defence?
🎧 Listen now 👇
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Few issues
1) success rate is 63%, 31st in league exl <20 attempts (CCV 3rd w 77%) (opta event data)
2) critique isn't just success % (where CBs benefit from SP), w Scales it's retreating w ball in air
3) 7th for top club CB not necessarily great anyway (last 3 seasons below)
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Average pass locations for Celtic v Livi + a couple of pass maps 🥰
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This week's newsletter is LIVE‼️
Every week:
⚽️ Statistical visualisations for EVERY match
⚽️ Tactical breakdowns for Celtic & Rangers
⚽️ xPoints tracking & analysis using my own industry standard model
Read here and subscribe (for FREE) if you enjoy!
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I know some people disagree - and that’s fine! - but the fluidity of Jota & O’Riley so far on our right is so critical to our system. Mooy’s strengths aren’t worth his limitations, especially when playing with Abada/Johnston as a trio
This week's newsletter discusses Aaron Mooy within the context of Celtic's more rigid right hand side, and the changes Beale has made to suit Rangers' squad 🤓
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Pending marking etc I’ll hopefully get this somewhere public… and maybe a podcast to talk through it?
The bad news is that it's international break. The good news is that I can avoid international football and spend the time I save reading
@SRFootball_
's Masters thesis on rest defence...
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Again, forgive the quality because I’m on my phone but this poor defending from Brown leaves 3 (including himself) ball chasing.
Thread.
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Ryan Christie
is it possible to have a negative xg per shot
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Points picked up before I said this:
Dundee United: 21
Ross County: 6
Points picked up since I said this:
Dundee United: 7
Ross County: 15
Regression, baby!
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Our tempo was off today, and I think these pass maps probably give a decent indication as to why...
Ralston and Turnbull both struggled often last season with playing incisive forward passes and the result of them both being rotated in today was no different 😬
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with the newsletter on hiatus, thought I'd drop these here (and muting immediately bc I remember what last season was like with this lmaoooo)
brief notes if you're new here:
1) under/over performance isn't good or bad, just unsustainable
2) this isn't a predicted final table
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It’s obviously an uncomfortable feeling when you lose players you like. It’s worse when we’ve a bad record of replacing them. If we want to be a modern, efficient club, though, you just can’t throw money at players to keep them past the optimum selling point
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Less of this please. We’ve been papering over cracks all season, stop making excuses for bad performances
Well done Rangers thoroughly deserved win against Celtic reserves...
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After Rangers' game there,
@DavFlan
mentioned to me how much of Rangers' offensive output comes from their fullbacks ⚔️
Thought it would be pretty cool to highlight how this compares to Celtic, and how this looks visually 👀
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90%, being submitted for publication 🫡
well, my dissertation can be shared in like a week or so 👀
(yes i know different ‘football’ sue me)
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🧐 Which passes do Celtic's strikers latch onto?
Kyogo tends to get onto halfspace cutbacks more while Giakoumakis gets onto long, wide crosses more
Passes the eye test in that we're more easily shown into less dangerous areas in build up without Kyogo's movement?
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bits of disagreement when this was posted from some of our fans who wanted another explanation for the number being low because results felt good… but, while outliers obviously exist, most examples AREN’T outliers 😬
so… it’s after around game 10 that signal starts to separate from noise. Celtic/Rangers now each played 11 (also conveniently meaning they’ve played everyone once)
points gap maybe flattering slightly so far…
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GIF Alert 🚨
Nothing to get you in the mood for the game tonight like a thread of some of Celtic's defensive issues 😍
👇👇
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The CCV/AJ right hand side felt very... Ralston? In that a lot of the passes were just the safe ones circulating wide right which is normally what CCV does so he ends up deeper because of it. I'll need to look in more detail when I rewatch I think
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Organised Attack
Even though Milan are expected to be dominant, they generally don't hold possession for possession's sake. They're direct to the final third and slick rotations and passing triangles create space to be exploited.
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Celtic’s regression has been pretty predictable for a while now (😔), but what is going on with Hearts & Livi??
Too small a sample to give definitive answers on model blindspots v variance but… yeah. Good if you’re a Hearts fan, less good if you’re a Livi fan!
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Dundee United 0-9 Celtic: Pass Locations (and bonus pass maps for the midfield 😮💨)
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GIF Alert 🚨
As an addition to the
@90MinuteCynic
Team Talk podcast with
@TheCynicWolf
@aconnolly91
and myself, I've put some extra analysis together.
Thread.
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I'm not sure I liked what Kyogo AND GG did to our midfield. Kyogo's role shifted from 8 to a loose 10 (sometimes going wide) as we moved forward and MOR pushed up to fill the gap - Hatate ended up dropping in a bit more because of this which took away from our chance creation imo
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In context, this isn’t a slump - it’s a decline. There has been nothing this season to suggest this gets better. Of course the league can be won despite a home draw with St Johnstone, but it won’t happen without more meaningful changes than motivation, effort etc
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😮💨 Celtic 6-1 Hibs (!)
O'Riley a little deeper which is nice to see. Bernabei & Haksabanovic really tore up the left hand side in the first half
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someone should probably consider marking Abada when he’s in the box
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For each gameweek in the Scottish Premiership:
⚽️ Updated & analysed xPoints for the league
⚽️ Breakdown of each game, with extra tactical insights for Celtic/Rangers
⚽️ Past xG reviewed
Available for FREE at
The latest table with reviewed xG 👇
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was just messing about with the template tbh but this is pretty interesting - makes sense the two most dominant teams would have shorter average passes, even just for more passes at the back. might do it for opp half passes tomorrow
🚨 Scottish Premiership: Average Shot Distance 🚨
Measured from the location of the shot to the centre of the goal in metres, here are the average (mean) shot distances of each team in the league so far 👇
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I’m simultaneously glad figures like Neville are speaking out against this and sceptical because of their silence while England have been getting 4 auto CL places + other nations scrap in countless qualifiers
The rich few being favoured isn’t a new development
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Signing wish list:
S̶t̶a̶r̶t̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶r̶i̶g̶h̶t̶ ̶b̶a̶c̶k̶ ✅ (loaned)
Backup right back
Starting left back
Starting centre back
Backup centre mid
Backup right winger
Backup left winger
Maybe planning a young striker move?
Good window 😬
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Cool to see my viz in this!
Enjoy the line
@Jon_Mackenzie
walks here. So easy to get sucked into data purism but we can’t wait until mid season to try and make sense of stuff. Working in probability, I think about this stuff a lot, and Jon does an excellent job of it here
After four games of the season Everton sit in the relegation zone with only 1 point. So they must be pretty bad, right?
@Jon_Mackenzie
has crunched the numbers and found reasons for Toffees fans to be positive.
-
Try The Athletic for FREE for 30 days:
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While I think it’s good that xG is becoming more mainstream, stuff like this that totally misunderstands the point and appropriate use of xG is… not
Hailing overperforming disenchants people from accepting xG because it’s unsustainable: they don’t keep it up = xG is useless 🙃
Love it or hate it, xG is now part of football.
So who is exceeding their expected goals? And who isn't?
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Sickened by the idea that someone who participates in and endorses the marginalisation of a group of people could be defended in this way. If you’re a bigot, you’re not a good person
This account will always stand with the trans community. Trans rights are not for debate 🏳️⚧️
JK Rowling secretly donated hundreds of thousands of pounds to save 100 female lawyers and their families facing execution in Afghanistan. Rowling is a humanitarian, a defender of women and a national treasure. The campaign against her has been utterly unhinged.
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The second edition of my Scottish Premiership roundup has arrived! Read it here, and subscribe for FREE if you haven’t already 👀
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Scott Brown was much better this weekend but I don’t think it’s as simple as his fitness coming back.
He stayed deeper and moved central making the midfield 3 more similar to a 1-2 than a 2-1 with Christie further right and McGregor pushed forward.
(1/4)
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