Dmitry

Dmitry

@dmitry.mclachbot.com

I like Chelsea Football Club I also like to complain about Chelsea Football Club

1.8K followers145 following1.8K posts

There are a few things I simply don't get about this great country, but nothing, absolutely nothing, has prepared me for the insanity that are school parents' WhatsApp groups

A thread on these frauds from West Midlands

McLachBot@mclachbot.com

Aston Villa have 33 points from 17 games. Their underlying numbers say they should have 18. That's a +15 point gap - the largest overperformance at this point of the season in recent Premier League history. Is this sustainable? Let's look at the data 🧵

If you want substantive critique, my substantive critique is that eigenvector centrality is somewhere between irrelevant and misleading in extremely small, fully connected networks like passing graphs and is probably highly correlated to just the number of passes a player made

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My second constructive critique is that if you think the image on the left is a more useful graphical representation of passing relationships in a game than the image on the right, then please do read, like, just a single book by Edward Tufte

That's not me having a go at you. Me having a go at you would be asking what university are you a professor at, so that I know which one to swerve for my kids education, because arrogance and ignorance is not a good combination for an educator.

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I should start a substack. You can apparently get a decent following there calling yourself an analyst despite not understanding why p90 metrics are useful to analyse player performance

He has the second highest number of touches p90 in attacking third on Spurs. I don't think "rarely sees the ball" is supported by evidence. What is true is that he simply can't do anything when he has the ball because he's extremely light weight and gets easily muscled off it

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One day, behavioural science will be advanced enough to explain how Morgan Rogers is considered by so many to be one of the best players in the league despite having a literal flaming pile of dog poop for statistical profile

Fun stat to highlight both how good he's been and also the absolutely dire state of striker quality in the Premier League: Enzo Fernandez is currently 4th in the league in total NPxG (3.8). Not 4th amongst midfielders, 4th overall.

Garnacho against Wolves yesterday. Led the team in xA (1.26) and successful deliveries into penalty area (10) and provided relentless passing threat into dangerous areas.

Anyway, here's a Claude AI generated list of all the players Chelsea have signed from Bundesliga since 2000, and I'll let you be the judge on how many of these actually turned out to be worth it.

Over the weekend someone pointed out to me that both Xavi Simons and Florian Wirtz have been found out as physically unusable in the premier league and I don't think it's exactly right. Wirtz actually had decent underlying numbers - he's xG+xA p90 is 0.44.

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Now, Xavi Simons OTOH has been pure garbage. Aside from being kind of active defensively which is think is more a reflection of how Thomas Frank sets up than his own skill, there's nothing there. Anyway, I collectively refer to this chart as Shit Butterfly

And no, to preempt the inevitable replies, it's not because Frank is a defensive manager. This level of ineptitude transcends style. I think it simply comes down to the fact that he's physically overmatched in the premier league

Over the weekend someone pointed out to me that both Xavi Simons and Florian Wirtz have been found out as physically unusable in the premier league and I don't think it's exactly right. Wirtz actually had decent underlying numbers - he's xG+xA p90 is 0.44.

He's been quite unlucky that Liverpool haven't been finishing the chances that he's created and that his own shooting is ice cold. Now, is 0.44 good enough considering his price? Not even close. But you can see the framework of a good premier league player there.

I don't even have a picture for Panichelli in my database yet but the guy is putting up ridiculous numbers. Strasbourg aren't going to miss Emegha at all when he moves to Chelsea.

Tosin yesterday lost 3 out of 4 aerial duels in or near our penalty box yesterday, which is just brutal considering that being a tall guy who wins headers is his entire raison d'etre (Red triangle - aerial duel lost, green triangle - aerial duel won)

If Manchester United do end up buying Sesko for £80m, they will have spent £210m on three attackers that outperformed their xG last season by a combined 16.5 goals. Zero red flags, no notes, would buy again.

If Manchester United do end up buying Sesko for £80m, they will have spent £210m on three attackers that outperformed their xG last season by a combined 16.5 goals. Zero red flags, no notes, would buy again.

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If Manchester United do end up buying Sesko for £80m, they will have spent £210m on three attackers that outperformed their xG last season by a combined 16.5 goals. Zero red flags, no notes, would buy again.

Mbeumo G-xG the last 5 seasons: -1.0, -5.5, -0.8, -1.4, +7.5 Cunha G-xG the last 5 seasons: -1.1, +0.2, -.6, +2.3, +6.4 Sesko, of course, has a total of like 45 90s and 110 shots at a top league that records xG so who even knows. Nothing to see here, move along.

This thread is absolutely fucking sending me

James Huntrods@jameshuntrods.bsky.social

Zoopla's new AI room designer sure is something. Just look at this run-down living room. With a bit of TLC you could have... er... toilet stairs? Why have a window when you could have some lovely art? Like this picture of bricks!

Is there some other West End I'm not familiar with? Because the one I know, you can't turn without bumping into a huge group of tourists at 9 pm and much later.

Joel@itsjoels.bsky.social

The idea that no one walks around the West End after nine pm is just absolute hokum.

Quantico Quaresma crying at home that he missed out on this.

Chelsea FC News@cfcnews.mclachbot.com

Chelsea invited Trump to present the Club World Cup trophy after beating PSG. His unexpected lengthy presence confused players, while his son Eric stated Chelsea viewed it as an honor, despite players' mixed feelings. By Matt Debono. Sports Illustrated

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Then I looked at the video and I thought, it kind of seems like he can't create separation for himself to shoot in packed space very well. So I don't know about this one.

He still runs with the ball in open space really really well and he's got a great shot on him, so he's going to be menacing on the counter. If I wanted to be pretty reductive about it, I'd say he's Liam Delap, with admittedly way, way, way better passing

Literally the first thing that struck me when I looked at his data was how few shots he actually takes *relative to his amount of touches in the box*. Kind of makes it seem like he can't create separation for himself to shoot in packed space very well.