We gonna score in a minute, but in which minute?

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Victory Through Harmony

By Walter Broeckx

The last thing you want to happen when you go to a football game is to miss the goals. It is what happened to me when I first came to London and fell in love with Arsenal. After that Saturday game which we lost to Wolverhampton Wanderers 0-1 we were so in love with Arsenal we immediately were looking if there was the chance to see them again during the time we were in London.

We couldn’t as Arsenal had to go to Nottingham Forest in the FA cup in the next days. But we had the chance to go and see Crystal Palace against ….Wolverhampton Wanderers. And off we went for a trip of a few hours with several buses down to the old ground of Crystal Palace before it was rebuilt.

On arrival we had a few minutes before kick off and some of us wanted to buy a souvenir. And the game started as we could hear and then suddenly a big roar from a small part of the crowd just as we entered the stadium.  And it was Wolverhampton that scored in the first minute. The only goal of the game. Now you know why I hate coming late in any stadium.

But here at Untold we leave no stone unturned to help you to avoid such miserable things. So how to avoid missing a goal at the Emirates?  Find the answer here below. So when do we score and I even have seen when we concede most of our goals.

So I divided the 90 minutes in 6 periods of 15 minutes. And I have looked at all the games we played this season and then checked when we scored most of our goals.

Time 0/15 15/30 30/45 45/60 60/75 75/90
total 12 8 15 14 9 22
% 15,00 10,00 18,75 17,50 11,25 27,50

So we score most of our goals in the last 15 minutes. Once again I would say as if my memory serves me right this was also the case last season.  So all those people who leave the ground early miss most of the fun.   Maybe they are part of the AAA and therefore are a bit unhappy as they haven’t seen all the goals?

But if one looks at those numbers you can see a recurring pattern in our games in each half. We start rather strong and then we have a dip between minute 15 and 30. And as I write match reports I constantly look at the time and I have noticed in most games we play a very strong 20-25 opening minutes and then we drop back a bit. I know that this is natural as you cannot play 45 minutes with the same tempo in a game. But the interesting thing is that the same happens in the second half.  We also drop back a bit in the second 15 minutes of the second half, just like in the first half.

And we can see a bit of reverse in this when we see at goals conceded.

Time 0/15 15/30 30/45 45/60 60/75 75/90
Total 0 4 8 9 3 9
% 0,00 12,12 24,24 27,27 9,09 27,27

To prove that we start strong we didn’t let in any goals in the first 15 minutes of any of our games so far! And this is in 35 competitive games so far this season. And even when we drop back in the second 15 minutes in each half this doesn’t mean we let in many goals in those periods. It is just that we sit back a bit but don’t concede many goals by doing this.

But there does seem to be a problem just before and after the break. As when you combine those 2 periods we let in most of our goals before or just after half time.  And we also seem to have a bit of trouble in the last 15 minutes of the game. As also in that period we concede a lot of goals.

So if you want to see all our goals I can only advise you to come on time and stay until the final whistle of the game.  And if you want to relax in a game in the knowledge the other team will not score easily you can relax in the first 15 minutes. You can be a bit scared just before and after half time and in the final quarter we tend to let in some goals if we let the other team score.

And to round this off I will add a more general statistic of our goals scored and conceded so far this season in all competitions.

GAMES 35
GOALS TOTAL 80
AVERAGE SCORED 2,29
GOAL AGAINST 33
AVERAGE AGAINST 0,94

Joint top scorers in the EPL, top scorers in the CL, a scoring record that is  not bad in the Carling cup so far and this leaves us with an average of over 2 goals scored in each game. 2,29 to be exact.  So not that bad I think.

We also let in less than one goal in a game so far this season. Must try to keep this average on and we should win each game with at least 2-1. And if we keep up our 3 goals per game as we are doing for the moment we could get an ever higher average and lower our goals against with the clean sheets we are keeping for the moment.

So despite us missing some 10 chances and goals in the Wigan game alone we are not too bad at scoring overall. And I do like us to miss a few chances  and only score 3 goals in a game more than score 6 or 7 in one game and then no goals in the next game.  So let us just keep on scoring 3 goals a game and keep the clean sheets.

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14 Replies to “We gonna score in a minute, but in which minute?”

  1. Even the AAA brigade will have to concede 80 goals in all competitions is not bad considering (according to them) we over elaborate and never shoot, especially from outside the area and Wenger has never bought a £40 million striker. Our goals against isn’t bad either considering the useless defenders that Wenger has signed and our lack of a decent defensive midfielder. Funny old game isn’t it!

  2. Two men in possession of tape measures were challenged by Emirates security staff at the weekend. The two, who turned out to be Ipswich employees,were questioned then released.

    An Ipswich spokesman said ” we were just checking to see if our brand new Neoplan Starliner with 52 Luxury Reclining Seats, air Con and DVD/CD Entertainment System (with the DVD of the first leg welded in to the tray) will actually fit through the gates of the ground.

    This will allow us to park the bus across the 6 yard line. If this is not possible, we will have to use our 10 year old ford transit, which doesn’t have nearly the same defensive qualities.”

    Wenger appeared unconcerned by the Ipswich tactics:

    ” We respect the opposition, but we will not worry about their game. We will worry about our own game, I mean… we won’t worry about our own game, as well as not worrying about their game. Our players will play the game the same as the last leg, er…no, I mean the players are capable of playing better than our last game.

    If we play well, if we show commitment, if we show desire to win, if we don’t let Denilson and Arshavin play at the same time… we will progress to the final of the illustrious Carling Cup”

    A sneak preview of the training session showed the team practicing trying to roll the ball under a replica of the Ipswich bus, but it didn’t look good – Bendtner kept hitting the wheels, RVP kept putting the ball over the roof, and Walcott had to be treated for concussion, as he just kept running straight at the bus.

    Wenger stated: ” The player is OK, he will be fine for the match.. He is working with our trainers, and he is now running with his eyes open.”

  3. After the first season at the Emirates, I jokingly wrote to the Club saying our season tickets should be cheaper at the South End than at the North end as so many more goals were scored at their end than ours.

    They didn’t take any notice.

    It’s evened itself up a bit over the years. But there’s still more scored down the other end.

  4. Anthony – great post, becauise it is pretty much true. Ipswich WILL park their bus in front of their goal and we will have to get past the thing. It wont be easy. They have a lead to defend, which is huge. It will be a tough night if we dont score early. If we score early, it could be a cricket score, because they may have to start moving that bus a bit.

  5. Paul,
    I agree, it won’t be easy. Particularly if we don’t score in the first 30 minutes or so. And if Ipswich happen to somehow nick a goal, we’ll need to score three.

    So I hope that we won’t see too many changes, ideally just the full-backs and Chamakh coming in for Van Persie. Especially when we don’t play again until Sunday, a home game against a League One side where rotation can be afforded far more than tomorrow night.

  6. Nice stats, Walter. Could you easily do something similar with 5 minute intervals? Because I think that would allow you to see trends even better.

  7. I think this is the most important game for years for the fans and club alike.
    A win will give us such momentum we will probably go on and win all games leading up to the Barcelona fixture and enter that game on a high.
    A loss could change confidence and moral and lead to all sort of questions been asked give the AAA a field day on how they were always right.

    We should win but its going to take all our players giving 110% for the 95 mins. It could be worse though its occasions like this the important games the nerves excitement and everything else we go through that makes it worth while supporting Arsenal.

  8. For those joining me tomorrow, lets just make some noise, and get behind the guys.

    Oh, and keep our fingers, legs, whatever crossed.

  9. What is all this talk about AAA. You guys are becoming too tribal. AAA, AKB and me – we all want to win tomorrow. We are all Arsenal fans – Victory through Harmony

    Interesting piece Walter – just hope we score early tomorrow – will calm my nerves. And Anthony very funny piece – you should write some more for this site.

  10. I would argue the case that all AAA want us to win tomorrow.
    Just look at sites like ANR you will see tons of pre match opions by the author and after the wins not a single line on the performance as the Author and his cronies were so sick at the result everything on the site and a few others is so negative its a joke.
    You see the comments about I hope we loose so wenger gets sacked for not buying a centre back etc.
    Your living in dream land JRR need to get out and about more.

  11. we have to deploy most of our 1st eleven ,we have to not break our winning momentum . pls lord coach take this game seriously.
    cannons till i die.

  12. RedGooner- I totally respect your right to have an opinion but with the greatest respect I do not agree.

    I suspect I would share many of your views as to where Arsenal is at but I don’t think labels like AKB or AAA are helpful. We need to rise above it.

    Read Le Grove this morning about the Ipswich game tonight or ANR about Chezzer. You simply cannnot describe either of those blogs as anti-Arsenal Arsenal.

  13. It’s high time we started a cheerleading team at The Emirates, complete with musical instruments and all. All fans should also come in with a whistle each, then we can whistle down the opposition, pump up the volume and really charge the atmosphere. This should be easier than singing since most of the home fans can’t sing. I think you should champion this idea, Walter.

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