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Writer's pictureTony McLaughlin

SPFL Pre-Split Review ... Part 1


This break in league games for International football and Scottish Cup football has given me the time to have a review of all teams in the SPFL for the first 33 games of the season.


I've looked at Home versus Away, NP xG, Shots, Possession, Box touches, Final 3rd passes and many many more.

I've compared them to the league average and also looked at Trends to see how teams are performing as we head into the Post Split fixtures.

Part 1 looks at teams in two ways - the Home team version and the Away team version in regards to points per game and NP xG as well.


Separating teams into their Home and Away versions topping the league are Rangers Home with a 100% record. However even their Away version is better than the rest at 2.41 points per game with our Home team in 3rd at 2.18 points per game.

The best of the rest (outside Celtic & Rangers) is Hibernian Away which is probably down to their preference for playing on the counter attack. From 6th upwards these teams all performed more than 50% above the median points per game with Aberdeen Home 51% above the median.


Kilmarnock Away are the worst performers with only 0.59 points per game and the only team more than 50% below the median of 1.21 points per game.


A very interesting stat is Aberdeen Away who are 16th out of 24 with only 4 wins this season and 1.13 points per game.


Also interesting to note is St Johnstone Home goals per game average of 0.5 which is 24th and is 54% behind the median of 1.09.


In regards of Trending;

- Hibernian Home in 7th are 1.44 points per game for the season but are 1.8 points per game for their last 5. A 25% positive Trending variance.

- Ross County Home in 19th are 0.94 points per game for the season but are 1.43 points per game for their last 7. A 52% positive Trending variance.

- Hamilton Away are 0.71 in their last 7 games (versus 0.88 season to date). 19% negative variance.

- Dundee Utd Away are 0.86 in their last 7 games (down 14%).


Looking at the graph below for Ross County at Home for NP xG on a 3 game rolling average you can see the difference John Hughes has made with the NP xGA declining and NP xG increasing and therefore narrowing the gap.


(The black line is for Ross County and the red line is for their opponents).


Also to give further context of the impact from John Hughes see below the overall (Home and Away) graph for NP xG on a 6 game rolling average. (John Hughes coming in after the Hamilton game).


You can see that overall Ross County managed to show a positive NP xG differential in recent games (on a 6 game rolling average).


Part 2 will look at NP xG for all teams in the SPFL. (NP xG details courtesy of @ModenFitba).



Celtic Trends 🍀📈⚽️



Tony@CelticTrends.com


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