Celtic under Ange Postecoglou have become a far more organised, high pressing and quick passing side, we can all see that with our own eyes, to a certain extend anyway. After all we know the change in style has resulted in a more pleasurable viewing experience and after a shaky start to the season, we’re on a bit of a roll.
The basic stats are clear as day, from October until now we’re unbeaten in 19 league games with 17 of them resulting in wins, our 53 points from a possible 57 has us top of the league, as we’ve picked up six more than our city rivals in the same timeframe.
But is the improvement matched in the stats, and is it likely the current momentum will result in Celtic coming out top? After all we only have eight more points at this stage than last season and last year was rotten, right?
Yet if we take our improvement and marry it to the drop off on the other side of the city, theRangers who have 62 points this season are on ten less that they were after 26 games last season, meaning there has been an incredible 18 point swing according to theanalyst.com who now state, ‘it is Celtic who can now claim the momentum heading into the final months of the Premiership season.’
And those guys at The Analyst have done a bit of a deep dive into Celtic’s stats and compared them to Ange Postecoglou’s Yokohama F. Marinos side and it makes for pleasant reading. First of all, take the organised pressing game we are witnessing every week, according to The Analyst…
From the successful 2019 season through to his departure in June 2021, Postecoglou’s Marinos side became known for their high press across the J1 League, with their average PPDA (opposition passes per defensive action allowed) the lowest in the league (9.4), a league-high tally of 1319 pressed opposition passing sequences in open play (allowing the opposition only three of fewer open play passes before ending that sequence in their own half) and the second-high tally of shot-ending high turnovers in the competition over the near two and a half year period (124).
So far this season in the Scottish Premiership, Celtic have a league-low PPDA average (9.2) and have attempted the second-most shots following a high turnover (38) with a league-high four goals coming from those. In addition, their open play sequences have, on average, started 43.4 metres from their own goal – the highest starting point by any side in the Scottish top-flight this season. Postecoglou’s tactical preference to aggressively press higher up the pitch has quickly been seeded in his Celtic team.
And the guys at The Analyst have also looked into the territorial dominance using a metric called ‘field tilt’ and it’s also brought up figures that are pleasing from a domestic perspective but also in comparison to sides operating in the top five European leagues, something all the more pleasing as Celtic head into the last 16 of the Europa Conference League against Bodo/Glimt on Thursday night, looking to win a knockout European tie after Christmas for the first time since 2004.
Field tilt is a metric to show the territorial dominance between teams. Put simply, it measures the share of possession a team has in a game, considering only touches or passes in the attacking third. It can be useful when trying to understand which team is more dominant in games, rather than looking at overall possession, mainly as it looks at how teams are able to get the ball into areas that matter.
Celtic’s field tilt average is 79% this season in the Scottish Premiership, meaning they have nearly four times as much possession in the final third as their opponents – the highest in the league ahead of Rangers (73%). Even in the Europa League this season, Celtic’s field tilt is positive (55%) and higher than well respected clubs from the top five European leagues like Lazio (51%), Monaco (49%) and Real Sociedad (51%). It’s clear that Postecoglou’s team like to take the game to the opposition.
And the improvements in Celtic’s overall performances have not been exclusive to the attacking metrics, instead the guys at The Analyst have uncovered that not only on the bare figures of goals conceded are Celtic on top form in the Scottish Premiership defensively, Ange Postecoglou has his side lower quality chances even in comparison to theRangers defence who conceded just 12 goals last season –
‘Celtic conceded 25 goals in 38 Scottish Premiership games last season – not an awful record, but they came up against Steven Gerrard’s record-breaking Rangers side, who conceded an astonishing 12 at an average of less than a goal every three games.
Celtic have already conceded more goals (14) than Rangers (12) did last season, but they have – believe it or not – restricted their opponents to lower quality chances on average than that exceptional Rangers’ 2020-21 backline.
Across their title-winning campaign in 2020-21, Rangers allowed opponents an average non-penalty expected goals per game of 0.68, with Celtic’s at 0.84. Amazingly, Celtic have restricted opponents to 0.59 xG from non-penalty shots so far this season – the best in the league and even better than Rangers last season. The Gers were saved on occasions last season by a combination of woeful opposition finishing, plus inspired goalkeeping from Allan McGregor – who prevented a league-high 8.9 goals based on Opta’s expected goals on target data (facing shots totalling 16.9 xGOT).’
And whereby theRangers defensive dominance was in the main due to the form of Alan McGregor last season, that has not been the case with Celtic as joe Hart has been forming at a rate expected in comparison to the shots he has faced, instead Celtic are showing a strong defensive consistency based on restricting opponents as a defensive unit rather than the reliance of Joe Hart to bail us out –
There’s been no such reliance on phenomenal goalkeeping this season by Celtic, with Joe Hart conceding at the expected rate based on the shots faced on target data (12 goals conceded from 12.3 xGOT), instead a solid defensive unit that has restricted opponents to a league-low average of 6.8 non-penalty shots per game, with the quality of those shots having the average xG of just 0.09 – lower than Rangers’ exceptional defence in 2020-21 (0.10).
Celtic’s improvement is perfectly clear to the naked eye; however, it also appears the stats show not only an improvement but a sustained and increasing advancement in both attacking and defensive metrics, and with a drop off evident from our rivals, if both are sustained as the season progresses Celtic’s it would appear, according to The Analysts deep dive on Celtic’s numbers, that the chances of their current momentum taking Celtic to the regaining of a league title seem a lot more realistic than they did back in August.
Niall J
