Do Newcastle need to create more chances (or just take them better?)

After replacing Allan Saint-Maximin with Harvey Barnes, Newcastle fans are worried that we won't have enough 'guile' to open up defensive teams. Are their worries justified?

With the sale of Allan Saint-Maximin now confirmed by the player himself, the words “low block” are occupying the thoughts of a lot of Newcastle United fans.

After losing the mercurial winger, a prevailing worry has spread through the wider discourse on Twitter. That without Saint-Maximin coming off of the bench to break down and create chances vs. an entrenched defence, we might not have enough creativity or guile in our attack.

While there it’s never bad to add more quality and creativity to your frontline, the widely-held view that Eddie Howe’s Newcastle struggled to create enough chances against teams that park the bus is not one I subscribe to.

Newcastle United chance creation in 22/23

The table below shows expected goals (xG) per-90 by team in the Premier League from the 2022/23 season. Newcastle are SECOND overall for the quality of the chances they create, with only Pep’s treble-winning Man City ahead of them.

Nearly a third of this total (0.49 xG) comes from set pieces, with Trippier’s right foot and the genuinely inventive routines cooked up by the coaching staff helping to generate a league-leading amount of chances and threat from corners and freekicks.

From open play, Newcastle are among the best teams in the division. Despite an obvious attacking talent deficit to the likes of Man City, Liverpool, Man Utd and Arsenal and Allan Saint-Maximin being available for just over 13 games worth of 90s last season, they are firmly in the top-6 in the league.

Even then, the difference between Newcastle and the very top teams here isn’t huge – it’s the difference of one or two extra open play shots per match. Beyond this, there’s already evidence that Howe’s team were improving and had already begun to bridge this gap.

Below is a ten-game rolling average trendline from the 22/23 season. Note how Newcastle’s Open Plan xG ⚫ improved as the season wore on and we reduced our reliance on set-pieces 🟡 to create opportunities to score.

As long as these trends continue – which admittedly isn’t certain in a competition as competitive as the Premier League - then Newcastle are ALREADY creating enough chances to win the majority of games.

If this is true, then why did it feel like such a struggle vs. Leicester and Leeds at St James’ Park?

This is a fair question, but one with a fairly boring answer. Fundamentally in both of these examples, Newcastle didn’t finish the ample amount of chances they created.

Here’s the xG Race Chart vs. Leicester… I mean games don’t get much more one-sided.

Newcastle hit the woodwork three times with Guimaraes, in particular, missing a guilt-edged header that would be scored 58% of the time and Isak missing a chance that would normally be taken 25% of the time too. The context of the pressure of this game should also be considered as mitigation, but in such a low-scoring sport not taking the chances you do create really has an impact.

This narrative was much the same against Leeds at home on New Year's Eve., where again Newcastle were comprehensively on top but couldn’t make the breakthrough.

In that game, we created three chances that would normally be scored at a rate of one in five, but we didn’t score any. While these days do happen for teams in front of goal, it could also be read as a sign that – outside of Wilson and Isak – we don’t necessarily have many consistent finishers from wider areas and in midfield.

Newcastle’s hot and cold streaks in front of goal

This lack of consistency and perhaps true quality can be seen across the entire 22/23 season, Newcastle United ended up -5.64 goals behind their xG total. This may not seem like too much, but considering that Newcastle drew 14 games last season, we’ve left a fair few points on the table through sheer prolificacy.

While the majority of these misses did come as a result of set plays rather than from open play, the best of these chances actually fell at the feet of players rather than being missed headers.

Nowhere was this inability to finish more obvious than through January, February and in the lead-up to the Carabao Cup final. You can see these swings by comparing our 10-game rolling averages for xG ⚫ compared to our actual goals 🟡.

That giant 🟡 dip in form in front of goal across January and February shook Newcastle United’s fanbase's collective confidence in our attack, a six-goal underperformance in those two months was utterly brutal and exhausting to watch as a fan.

Even once Alexander Isak’s form helped arrest the slump, the memory of it lingered –and still does to some fans. When this was combined with the form of the chasing pack for the Champions League spots the general anxiety about our ability to open teams up hasn’t really subsided, even after smashing six in twenty minutes against Spurs.

Moves for Barnes and Tonali should help us be more consistent in front of goal

In the context of these figures, the moves for Sandro Tonali and Harvey Barnes make even more sense. Longstaff’s lack of composure in front of goal has seen him miss all six of the high-value chances (greater than or equal to 0.20xG) that have come his way in the Premier League since breaking into the first team in 2018. Tonali on the other hand converted 5 of 6 chances of the same value in the Italian top division since joining Milan in 2020.

While Maxi’s finishing is better than Longstaff’s and in line with his xG numbers, he has scored just slightly better than one every ten league games. Barnes on the other hand manages just better than a goal in every three games. It doesn’t take genius-level maths to see that he represents a step forward in this regard.

If you’d like a full breakdown of Barnes’ ability in front of goal, you can read that here but in summary, I wouldn’t dwell too much on Newcastle’s ability to create chances.

The data shows we already creating at a rate that puts us among the top six in the league it’s our ability to convert these chances consistently that will help us take the next step.