Daryl Dike Cares Not for Your xG
But how much should we care about it?
We’ve talked about Daryl Dike quite a lot in this newsletter, mostly because he keeps giving us reasons to talk about him. And if you’ve followed along with any of that, you probably know that there’s two very widely-held opinions on Daryl Dike: first, that he rules, and second, that his Expected Goals numbers aren’t great.
Expected Goals isn’t quite the bogeyman it was even a couple years ago, mostly thanks to VAR being the new existential crisis battering down the hallowed halls of proper football, mate. Every now and then we’ll see some high-profile rants about xG, still, but for the most part it’s entered a status as a widely-accepted analytical tool to help determine how teams and players, broadly, are doing with chance creation, and how likely they are to score goals. We’ve even, I think, began to understand how xG is just data, and like all data, is best understood when there’s a whole lot of it. Yes, the individual match xG maps are pretty and can very quickly help you establish a narrative about a game, whether that narrative is accurate or not. In general, however, I think the general soccer-following public is a bit more wise on how to use and apply xG than they were a couple years ago, when a single game’s xG told you everything you needed to know and subtracting a player’s goals from expected goals was supposed to tell you… something, I’m sure.
So, why do people keep talking about xG when they talk about Daryl Dike, and why do other people in turn react so strongly to the argument? Well, pretty simple actually. Daryl Dike over-performs his xG. Like, by a lot.
That Doyle tweet is from a month ago, which means it came *before* Dike scored multiple braces in two of his last three starts. Dike is averaging 0.74 goals per 90 minutes in a little under 900 minutes for Barnsley, which is about double his expected goals mark. He’s one of the hottest strikers in the Championship, scoring seven goals in 13 appearances, and he’s only put the ball on frame eleven times. Shooting the ball at the target 11 times and scoring seven of those times is just not supposed to happen, really, especially for a team like Barnsley, who aren’t exactly playing tiki taka out here. And it’s not new for Dike, either. FBref had his Orlando City non-penalty xG over the past year at 0.29/90 minutes, while his actual goals are at 0.59/90.
With numbers like these, Daryl Dike is either one of the greatest strikers in the world at the present moment, or he’s simply bullying Championship defenses (and MLS before them) and getting very lucky, meaning his numbers will regress to the mean sooner or later.
You can see why this dichotomy is upsetting to people. Everyone wants to believe in Daryl Dike. Why would you not? He is, by all accounts, a phenomenal person. He radiates fun and positive energy, even when he’s tossing aside defenders like they are the approximate size and weight of a baby goat. And he’s only twenty, not even two years removed from playing college soccer. Of course we want him to be the best striker in the world. We want him to be commanding 20 million dollar price tags (unless you’re an Orlando City fan). The criticisms of Dike, then must be overblown. The nerds are trying to be Debbie Downers again.
On the other hand, the nerds are just trying to apply the numbers the same way they do to everyone else. Dike’s numbers are pretty monumental in their efficiency at present. He’s over-performing his underlying numbers like two guys named Robert Lewandowski and Erling Haaland are. That is, in all inevitability, not sustainable, correct? A jump to a higher level will most likely expose all this, right? So we return to the most logical conclusion, and tell people it might be wise to pump the brakes a bit on the hype train.
In the end, Expected Goals is a tool for analysis. It, by and large, helps us predict who will score goals and who will not. But it’s also not indicative of what will always happen game to game, and there will always be outliers and anomalies that seem to beat the numbers, even if only for a time. Maybe Daryl Dike is actually siphoning all of his goals directly from the xG that Brighton & Hove Albion is creating.
Which brings us to the most important question: how much should you care about Daryl Dike’s xG? The obvious answer is “as much as you want to,” but that’s a bit of a cop-out.
I think there’s a lot of sense in feeling some trepidation in Dike’s xG and how his game would theoretically translate to the Premier League. I don’t think he will continue his current run of goal-scoring form there. On the other hand, I didn’t expect him to continue his run of goal-scoring form with Barnsley, and he’s kept that up. And if you’re showing the ability to do things like this on a semi-regular basis, then you’re going to keep giving us very good reasons why you over-perform xG.
I’m all the way here for Daryl Dike: xG Anomaly. Because xG is also nothing without context. He is only 20. He doesn’t even have two years of pro soccer under his belt, and he’s still doing things like this in a league that is not easy to succeed in. Barnsley are something like the Anti-Brentford when it comes to chance creation. And even if Dike’s scoring rate does dip, he still has so many intriguing qualities and potential to his game that he’s worth the hype, anyway.
Should you care about Daryl Dike’s xG? Not if it takes away from the joy of watching the young man go to work.
NWSL Just Dropped Pure Heat
We got not one, not two, but FOUR new kits dropped today, and they all go disgustingly hard.
We’re talking sashes. We’re talking flowers. We’re talking prints that go boldly where no prints have gone before.
Make sure to keep everyone’s wallets in your thoughts and prayers today. It’s going to be tough for them.
Your CONCACAF Dispatch
If you’ve been paying any attention to the CONCACAF Champions League but wish you knew more about the teams that MLS and Liga MX teams are squaring off with, you should probably be following Jon Arnold and his newsletter, which has a great interview up currently with the 24-year-old manager of Nicaraguan underdogs Real Esteli, Holver Flores.
Speaking of the CONCACAF Champions League…
This was a yellow card, in case you somehow missed it.
The Union kits look great, though.