In our analysis, we evaluate all the players who played in Primeira Liga/Liga Betclic until March (01-03-2024) focusing, primarily, on the goals in Primeira Liga.
Goals are an essential factor in football. Therefore, it is important to assess the players who “fulfil” this role on the pitch. For this, we need to evaluate all the positions as well as the goal-related indicators. Therefore, our analysis focuses on three key points:
- Goals vs Expected Goals;
- Biggest xG Under-performers & Over-performers;
- Goals per 90min vs Expected Goals per 90min;
1 – Goals vs Expected Goals
Conducting an initial analysis, we noticed that there are some players who stand out. In the top right-hand corner, we can see some players with a high number of Goals and xG (Expected Goals):
As highlighted in the graph above, the league’s top scorers are Braga’s Simon Banza and Sporting’s Viktor Gyökeres. Furthermore, we emphasise that both these players have a clearly better goal scoring record than their expected goals. In addition to these athletes, we can see that a lot of the players are in the “Over-performing xG” section, even players from smaller teams such as Arouca’s Rafa Mújica, Vizela’s Samuel Essende and Chaves’s Héctor Hernández. In the opposite section, we find 5 players that are underperforming their xG: Benfica’s Rafa Silva, Boavista’s Róbert Bozeník, Sporting’s Pedro Gonçalves, Rio Ave’s Emmanuel Boateng and Braga’s Álvaro Djaló.
2 – Biggest xG Under-performers & Over-performers
In this second section, we introduce the four players who under-performed and over-performerd xG the most:
Of the players featured in this graph, we need to highlight Tiago Morais. Tiago was transferred from Boavista to Lille in January and one of the main reasons for the quality season he was having was his incredible ability to finish in front of goal. On the negative side, FC Porto’s wingers (Pepê and Galeno) are struggling to score goals in Primeira Liga.
3 – Goals per 90min vs Expected Goals per 90min
Lastly, we look at the performance of these same players in terms of Goals and Expected Goals per 90 minutes. This type of view will allows us to better understand and compare players numbers since the number of games isn’t weighed so heavily. However, in order to obtain unbiased results, we placed a minimum limit on the number of games played (5 full games = 450 minutes).
Being one of the players with the most goals in Primeira Liga, Simon Banza’s performance is reinforced (and highlighted in this chart) by his incredible Minutes to Goals ratio. Simon Banza’s performance is, by far, the best among Primeira Liga players with significant minutes played.
MORE PRIMEIRA LIGA CONTENT:
BEST PLAYERS IN PRIMEIRA LIGA – PORTUGAL (MAR 2024)
GAME CHANGERS – PRIMEIRA LIGA 23/24 #2
Data from FBref.
