Bear with us.
Think of an equaliser - if the match ends after the equaliser, then it will have been decisive in deciding the outcome. Or what about the goal that puts a team ahead. If Arsenal are drawing and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scores to make it 2-1, even if the game finishes 5-1, his goal is deemed decisive as it changed the match state.
We can accumulate these goals for forwards across a season and it is a useful statistic because, to use an Americanised term, we can identify ‘clutch’ forwards who score in moments where his team really needs him. It allows us to also avoid ‘goal-padders’, forwards whose goals arrive in the 85th minute of a 5-0 win when the game is already won. Put simply, the decisive statistic digs out the forwards doing the heavy lifting for their teams in terms of points gained.
And there’s a reason why we reference Aubameyang in the example above;
From the opening day of the season, when Auba’s goal clinched the points in a 1-0 win at Newcastle, he has been bailing an average Arsenal team out on a regular basis. In his next outing against Burnley he struck the winner again, in a 2-1 triumph, then in the derby with Tottenham his equaliser earned his team a point from 2-0 down. That’s in effect a five-point swing in the first month of the season.
; removing penalty goals from the equation, his shot-to-goals conversion rate is 25.4%, second only to Jamie Vardy, while in terms of Non-Penalty Goals P90 his score of 0.62 is fourth in the league, behind Sergio Aguero, Gabriel Jesus and Danny Ings.
Why do we hate penalties so much that we want to remove them from the stats? Well, not every forward gets the chance to take them, leading to unfair comparisons, and the free hit at goal offered by a penalty offers us nothing in terms of analysing a forward’s overall strike play. And in these metrics Auba excels in a team which absolutely hasn’t. Arsenal’s reliance on him is further emphasised by the fact that he has contributed 42% of his team’s non-penalty goals in the league - only Ings (44%) has a higher rate.
Most Decisive P90 (Min 1,000 mins, min five goals)
Big-game Jordan‘s goals have directly contributed to Palace picking up 12 points:
Most Decisive (%) (Min 1,000 mins, minimum five goals)
His only non-decisive league goal came at Old Trafford, where he opened the scoring, Patrick Van Aanholt’s winner being the decisive strike in that match. If we take away Ayew’s goals altogether, Palace are suddenly level with Bournemouth, West Ham and Watford in the relegation positions.
Ayew cost just £2.5m but his goals are probably worth £100m to the team finances, keeping them well clear of relegation for another year, no matter what happens with the COVID-19 crisis.
We should also reassess Roberto Firmino’s efforts. His lack of goals have meant he has been overshadowed by Mo Salah and Sadio Mane, but of the eight Premier League goals he has scored, six have been decisive, including two crucial winners away to Wolves and Tottenham in January. And even the much-maligned Sebastian Haller’s modest total of seven goals includes four decisive efforts.
But what about at the other end of the scale; which players are scoring goals which don’t amount to much of anything? Well, of Bernardo Silva’s five goals this season, none have been decisive, while attacking midfielders Todd Cantwell and James Maddison have just one of their six goals being decisive, respectively.
And Ings’ goals may be heralded as turning Southampton’s season around, but just three of his 15 (20%) have been decisive; in fact Ings is the king of the consolation goal. His strikes v Liverpool (L 2-1), Tottenham (L 2-1), Chelsea (L 4-1), Everton (L 2-1), Newcastle (L 2-1), Tottenham (L 3-2) and Burnley (L 2-1) all counted for nothing in those fixtures, and while it’s not Ing’s fault that his team-mates can’t ensure his efforts are worthwhile, it’s misleading to suggest that their upturn in fortunes is down to his goals.
Least Decisive (%) (Min 1,000 mins, minimum five goals)
B. Silva
Troy Deeney
And it’s very interesting to see two of the leading names. Jamie Vardy is, no doubt, an integral part of how Leicester play but just two of his Premier League-leading 19 strikes have been decisive, and there’s a whole lot of goal padding going on in batterings of Newcastle, Southampton, and Aston Villa (twice).
Plus the difference between Sergio Aguero and Gabriel Jesus is stark; the two have largely shared the striking position at City but five of Jesus’ 10 league goals are decisive, while just two of Aguero’s have.
Does Pep Guardiola think of such things? Who knows. But all goals aren’t made equal, and some statistics show it better than others.