Lies' Damn Lies and Statistics

[Yewsman]

According to the BBC website we had 65% possession and Bury had 35% tonight. frankly I am amazed that Bury had as much as 35%. I can only assume that the statistician counted the time taken by their goal keeper to take goal kicks and free kicks as their possession as apart from this they hardly had any possession at all. Does anyone know who actually records the statistics and how they are compiled. Are there any guides as to how they assess possession and what constitutes a shot etc.?

 

[PokerBlade]

I've thought about this before, and I have no idea how they measure it. What I've noticed is that it's very rare to get beyond 65/35, which makes me think that something in the methodology places a bit of a cap on it.

 

[BigBed]

2 stop watches, we're in possession and ours ticks, they have possession, theirs ticks, simple as.
90mins and 2 clocks that add up to it.
Then they work out the percentage wearing rose tinted glasses and in a generous mood.

 

[PeterNdlovu081]

 

[seanbeenstattoo]

All these stats are utter bollox. If you're at the game you know what happened.
Tonight we had loads of possession. Used most of it piss poorly and slowly with immense predictability and got a deserved but totally uninspiring win and 3 vital points.
That's all she wrote.

 

[Ricky]

I often think the people responsible for the BBC's match stats don't know what 'possession' is.

 

[ken shabby]

Aye, it`s a bit like the stat i saw watching some prem game other day... successful passes completed, well this is just a jolly for boring fuckers like jordan henderson and carrick and david batty who pass sideways and bloody backwards , and the prem say oo look henderson has a 95% pass completion when 92 % were passed to an unmarked lucas loitering behind him, 3% to nathaniel cheap mans walker and 5 % he scuffed to the oppositon.

they should have proper stats : good passes, shit passes, passes me granny could make, setting up chances passes and passes that are more lethal to the blokes bovril at back of the kop.

Bury can`t have got beyond 25% possession perhaps they also included time it took their two lads to get the early foamy bath.

 

[Revolution]

Aye, it`s a bit like the stat i saw watching some prem game other day... successful passes completed, well this is just a jolly for boring fuckers like jordan henderson and carrick and david batty who pass sideways and bloody backwards , and the prem say oo look henderson has a 95% pass completion when 92 % were passed to an unmarked lucas loitering behind him, 3% to nathaniel cheap mans walker and 5 % he scuffed to the oppositon.

I believe this is one of the key reasons why Leon Britton is so overrated.

 

[Yewsman]

So when JOC Miss kicked the back pass in second half if that had gone into the goal would that have counted as a shot on target by Bury? If not then they would have scored a goal with no shots on target as according to BBC they had only one shot and that was "off target". Statistics!

 

[Damski]

What do you trust. Inpartial statistics gathered by a neutral party being paid (I assume) to watch an entire game with the sole purpose of gathering data, or your own biased, distracted, hazy lager-ridden memories of the event? Just because you are guessing it could or should be higher, that's all you've got to go on?

65/35 is HUGE, BTW. As said earlier, it's rare to top that. It's mightily impressive, whichever way you look at it. I know all these stats technically don't matter, but it's also an important window into assessing performance, and so anything but the most impartial stat-gathering would be a big waste of everyone's time.

 

[BusheyBlade]

So when JOC Miss kicked the back pass in second half if that had gone into the goal would that have counted as a shot on target by Bury? If not then they would have scored a goal with no shots on target as according to BBC they had only one shot and that was "off target". Statistics!

On the old Sensible Soccer game it was possible to score a goal by shooting from the edge of the box into the opposite corner of the goal. More times than not it would go in but would never register as a shot on goal, let alone on target. I used to love winning games 3 or 4-0 without a single shot on goal. Little things and all that.