🔗 Share this article

One of the biggest stories of the EPL season so far concerns the drop of scoring in open play and how sides are netting increasingly from set-plays instead.

Comparing how goals have been scored to the initial 11 matches the prior season, we note a drop of 39 goals in open play and 26 more from team set-pieces and penalties, giving us 13 fewer in total.

Examining the bigger picture, shot attempts teams are taking have seen a remarkable drop of 370 in open-play than at this stage last season.

And despite the notable jump in set-piece goals, there have actually been just two more attempts produced from these situations outside of spot-kicks, indicating how effective clubs are at finding ways to net from dead-ball chances.

Goal Averages Reveal a Story

301 total goals recorded in the first 110 fixtures to date calculates at nearly 2.75 goals per fixture, which if it continued for the whole season would be the smallest for since 2020-21, back in 2020-21 (2.69).

Yet merely 196 scores scored in open play averages out 1.78 per fixture and is heading to be the lowest for 16 seasons, back in 2009-10 (1.76 average).

That campaign also marks the sole English top-flight season to experience goals scored more often from non-penalty set-pieces than this season's rate of 0.77 per game (0.79).

Which Sides Bear the Most Responsibility?

When it comes to goals scored from open-play, Wolves have seen the most significant decrease, registering only four in their first 11 fixtures, a reduction of 10 than this point the previous campaign.

Apart from Wolverhampton, England's top division's decline in open play goals is very much a London phenomenon, with five out of the capital's seven sides netting at least five goals fewer from open play than the prior season.

In fairness, this is primarily due to them netting lots of scores at the early stages of the previous campaign instead of them having difficulty to convert in open play this campaign.

Conversely City have recorded the most significant jump, with almost every one of the 23 they've scored so far coming in open-play.

Set-Piece Success

We've compared the promoted teams with those that were relegated they replaced. Play-off champions the Black Cats have scored three more scores in open-play than the Saints did in their first 11 games en route to relegation the previous campaign.

Regarding goals scored from set-pieces (not counting spot-kicks), the Gunners and Chelsea have experienced the biggest increase, with both sides replacing the reduction of five goals that they've scored in open-play with an equal amount from dead-ball situations.

Man United have scored double the number goals from set-pieces as they achieved in the first 11 matches the previous campaign before Ruben Amorim took charge, while the Black Cats once more are better at netting than the fellow red-and-whites they replaced.

City appear not to have received the memo about increasing scoring from set-pieces, since they've scored a reduction of three than the previous campaign, like Forest, even if this may result from the altered approach they have tried to implement.

Overall Patterns

Six sides – the Gunners, Chelsea, Fulham, Newcastle, Spurs and the Hammers – are this term's top trend-setters by recording fewer goals from open-play and more from set-plays, while Man City are the unique club to buck the trend to date by performing the complete reverse.

It will be fascinating to observe if sides continue to rely so heavily on set-plays as the season goes on or if they find again their overall inventiveness and begin converting more goals in open play as well.