Season 23/24

I make this thread for myself. Not too many contributors here. It is sad the forum seems to have failed. Anyway. I could have written this in notebook or word, but it seems more logical to put it here.


We are at a crossroads. Why? A little bit because I say so. Also because of the international matches break. My wish is 2 points per match every season. Will that happen? Never say never, but it is highly unlikely. What I will do is a bit to compare this season to last season. Unfortunately modern football has become a bit like I heard someone say on YouTube. He said, "it feels like it is the controller of the company that dictates the play". Of course meaning that modern football is analysed too much down to numbers and statistics. Reducing the player's freedom and creativity. Not that I see any creative geniuses like Hagi or Baggio in today's football anyway.

Well here is the thing, we have played 12 games and that is very close to 1/3 of the season. Points per game is 1.42. That is very far away from last season's 1.95. Last season we scored 60 goals. That is actually not that great, but considering we only conceded 30 we ended up plus 30 goals. This season we don't have a positive goal difference. Is it negative then? Not that either. We have conceded 13 goals which is of course too much if we want to match last season's conceded goals. That said. Of course it is not the biggest problem. Our average of conceding 1.08 goals per match will end at 41 goals conceded after 38 matches. That is liveable. It is the goals scored that is the problem.

Or at least a bigger problem. We don't create chances and we don't score enough goals. The prior is the bigger problem. As mentioned by Alasdair Mackenzie we are far down at the rankings in Serie A when it come to creating chances. Individually we have Felipe Anderson at 6th place with 5 chances created. We find Luis Alberto at 18th spot. As a team it just looks worse though. We are number 14 when it comes to most goals scored. Number 14 with assists with 9 assists total. That means the rest of the goals are scored from penalties, free kicks or deflections from the opposition. Goals plus assists we are still 14. Unleashed shots are 132. It might sound good, but that qualifies for spot 14. Shot created actions puts us on spot 15. As for expected goals it is 13.3 for these 12 matches where we have scored 13 goals. Surely it can be frustrating with missed chances, but that is nowhere near the main problem.

All this said. If we go back to conceded goals. Did we concede more goals at the start of the season? The short answer is yes. So we have improved. If we divide these 12 games into 3 we get 7 goals conceded in the first 4 matches. 4 Goals conceded in the next 4 matches, and 1 goal conceded in the last 4 matches. I do believe it will continue like that with a reduced conceded goal amount per game. It is not a guarantee for a good continuation of the season though.

Possession then? Number 9. Of course having the ball does not guarantee a win. I imagine Sarri wants us to be top 3 though. Also strange to see Roma ahead of us. Could all of this be due to the departure of Milinkovic Savic? The short answer is no. He was not that great last season. Probably a lot of players have struggled to find the great form they had last year. Also it has been surprisingly difficult for some of the new players even to adapt or to fit in. It seems the team and Sarri has had to change a bit. As for Guendouzi I exclude him from that. It seems like he gets it and he has done so from day one. Furthermore. I always hope for almost no changes around New Year. At Summer we must dare to do changes. Three names that appears in my mind are Marusic, Alberto (unless he really wants to stay) and Immobile. No player is bigger than the club.

Passing in itself does not show too much of how much a team scored or how many points a team gets. However. I have repeatedly said we are a short passing team. I am happy to be right there as we place second behind Napoli. I don't know for sure but my guess is that Sarri thinks long balls is just a bigger chance of losing the ball. Also we don't have a great fighter in the air. Personally I hope this continues. It is great to see when the ball starts with Provedel, moves out to Romagnoli or maybe Marusic. Then we find some tight passes under pressure with quick combinations that just outplays the opposition. It does not happen often, but when it happens it is beautiful.

Finally we are 19th youngest squad when it comes to most used players with an average age of 29.2. Milan and Torino is worth mentioning here as thay are teams on the top half with quite a young average age. It is absolutely worth mentioning who's number 20 with 29.9 though, Inter.

All in all. The team just needs to improve. How? Risk more? What I have noticed in these 13 games is we do not try to pass enough. We do not try to pass properly. At least not as much as we did last season. We seem too stressed, and that surprises me considering we did a lot better last season. Also. The players seems to lack creativity. I don't know how that can be solved without new players (obviously Alberto is an exception). We are in Champions League and the player's do not seem entirely motivated. Surprising. I do believe it will improve from here. 1.42 first 13 games. 1.70 next 13 games is my hope and belief. Upwards and onwards!