FanPost

Shots on Goal and the Myth of Possession

Not too long ago I went to a game with my father-in-law. He is a new follower of "soccer", and has begun to watch games often. It is something he's learning to enjoy, and in turn I'm enjoying seeing this older man watch a game with eyes full of wonder and excitement. Everything is somewhat new to him.

Our local team has been doing well, although we lost a critical game not long ago. I told him how much it sucked that we lost that game.

He smiled and said - "We should've won that game. We had more possession.". I could only cringe a bit, and follow with a small smile - "Yes, we should've won that game".

His assessment wasn't off, but it wasn't accurate. Many of you probably nod at the notion, particularly if you've had the chance to follow the game for a long time. Newer followers of the game will be inherently affected in their view if they joined during the most recent "golden era" of Barcelona and Spain, when possession ruled the land. Pundits everywhere showered those teams with incredible adjectives as "magnificent", "completely dominant" or simply put "the best of all time". It must be hard for many of those fans to have lived through those years and to try to imagine a game where possession wasn't the most sacred statistic, where there was no non-destructive answer to such strategy and where every cool kid would convert to the new Tiki Taka religion. Many of those fans must surely feel brokenhearted as this era comes to a close. In that way, I understand their doom-saying and overreactions, as they probably didn't live or experienced through times where both Barca and Spain were nowhere near as good.

This is, of course, not an argument against those teams. They were the best in the world, and that Barca team played with tempo and with a clear intention. Guardiola described it best as "possession with intention", but I digress.

Possession is indeed a vital statistic in our game, and one of several good indicators of how a team plays. "It is important, but I would look more into shots on goal." - I told my companion as we sat down in our seats - "In that game we kept pushing but there were barely any attempts to win it."

That phrase made him look at me quizzically (with a slight amused grin, I might add) - "What do you mean? We were trying very hard to win!!"

Interestingly, it was precisely Johan Cruyff who said "If you can’t win, make sure you don’t lose". That is precisely the way I like to think of possession: as the ability of a team to "not lose". Simply put, possession is the most efficient way to prevent a goal, as you take the ball away from the other team, can make them chase it and simply get them to tire or even frustrate them. This is all about controlling the game and making the opposing team play to your tempo and your strategy.

Possession is a defensive maneuver.

Yes, you can score from possession, but that is one of the possible outcomes that come from the ability to keep the ball. When you look at the possession statistic, what you're seeing is "out of the 90+ mins, team A held the ball X% of it" which can simply be translated to "team A kept team B from scoring during X% of the time". Notice that doesn't describe "team A attempted to win during X% of time". Possession doesn't win games. Goals do. While how you win (the way a team plays) may matter to every fan, the bottom line in our game are goals. Goals are everything.

So, yes, I am not saying anything new. Just rambling on how possession seems to be so vital to many.

Talking about that game with my in-law, our local team was having good possession, by the way. They kept the ball and moved it along, trying to pry open the defense with a swift through pass. The defense held though. The opposing team was far more vertical, and attempted to shoot as soon as they got close to goal.

"So this is what you meant? All this possession and we hadn't had a shot in 45 minutes!"

"Sorta. This sucks, but at least their shots were just attempts."

It was then that the idea for this long post came. It bothered me that the stats displayed at the stadium only showed "Attempted shots", "Possession", "Fouls" and "Goals"".

The key statistic is "Shots on Goal" or "Shots on Target".

Why "Shots on Target"? Of all the statistics you can pull, this is the one that can be translated to "Attempts to WIN THE GAME". This is referring to every attempt a team had to score a goal. There is no other statistic that truly describe how close a team was to win it. "Overall Shots" or "Attempted shots" only describe how often the team attempted to attempt to win (although it includes Shots on Target). Like "Possession", "Attempted shots" only serves to describe a team's intent. Games aren't won on intent either.

"Shots on Goal/Target" describe an offensive maneuver.

Yes, you can lose a game even if you have higher shots on target than the opponent, but at that point you're running a numbers game. Simply put, the probability of winning increases proportionately to the amount of shots on target. Think about it: the higher the number of shots within the three posts the higher probability of one of them turning to a goal. It is rather simple. "Shots on Target" clearly defines the team closest to the win.

Back to our game, it was the 84th minute, and our team had a paltry 2 or so shots attempted. We needed a win. My father-in-law and I were nervous, and at the edge of our seat. Our team knew they had to win, and you could tell they were beginning to get desperate. With no team having real Shots on Goal, our team having most Possession, and the other team having more Attempted Shots, I believe you can imagine the kind of game we had.

Finally, one minute later, our team finally got a shot on target... it was a GOAAAAAL! We and the entire stadium erupted. We were getting silverware!

"Finally!"

"Yup, finally some shots on goal!"