Are we steering towards a more offensive football?

Haaland, Lautaro, Kane, Messi, Mbappé... Goalscorers are essence of football, and without them, nothing would make sense. That's why the more goals there are, the better for the fans, but where do the players score more and how do they evolve? ProFootballDB, the BeSoccer data laboratory, has studied their frequency - by game - in the major leagues.

The report looks at the average number of goals per game in the Bundesliga, Serie A, the Premier League, the Spanish League and Ligue 1 from the 2000-01 season to the current - not yet finished - season. This allows us to draw several curious conclusions.

Germany, goal queen

The Bundesliga is by far the league with the most goals per game on average since the beginning of the new century. It has only come second in the 2016-17 season, with Serie A coming out on top, albeit not very dominantly.

The current campaign, in fact, is one in which this competition is taking the biggest distance from the rest of the leagues. There are 3.23 goals per game against 2.91 in Italy, 2.72 in England, 2.54 in Spain and 2.52 in France. However, there are still several days left - except in France, where the competition has been suspended.

France, by far the least fertile

With a quick glance at the ProFootballDB chart, it is easy to see that the Ligue 1 is clearly in the background. There has only been one season where they were not last: 2017-18, when the Premier League took the bottom place.

Otherwise, it has always been last, and usually by quite a margin, especially from 2000 to 2011, when it was closer to the average. Another aspect that stands out, and which is once again evident in the graphics, is that its goal value is on the rise.

Spain, England and Italy, the average 

The Spanish League, the Premier League and Serie A are the most difficult for analysts to make statements on. They have taken turns in second, third and fourth place over the years. For example, this season, it is Serie A that, for the moment, takes the silver.

But this has not been the case on many other occasions when either LaLiga or the English Premier League have been placed just behind the Bundesliga. The trend for this year is almost the same, and even more so with the cancellation of Ligue 1, which will leave it far behind in the comparison.

The future is bright and full of goals 

One clear takeaway from our study is that there is a clear trend towards more goals in the big leagues. Ligue 1 is closer to the others; the Bundesliga is insatiable; the others are in their endless pits...

The fact is that all the major leagues have reached their highest goals-to-games ratio since 2017. Italy, with its massive rise in 2018, has been the most impressive, while the others have only just overtaken it. Once again, Ligue 1's record-breaking progress has been made in two consecutive seasons (2016-17 and 2017-18).

The teams and their players, key to this evolution

That there are more and more goals in every duel is no coincidence. It's the teams that are the key factor and, by giving concrete examples, the trend is much easier to understand. Since 2000 - the beginning of the study's sample - several phenomena have emerged that explain this rise.

PSG and its spectacular improvement are the result of the high investment of its current president, Pep Guardiola's Barça, Jürgen Klopp's Liverpool; Bayern, always sweeping the counter-attacking game that has worked so well at clubs like Borussia Dortmund and Real Madrid; Atalanta, with its impressive goal average this season; Napoli, who prioritized attacking football under Sarri...

And it is not just about styles, but about the players who embody them. It has been in these 20 years that the figures of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, for example, have appeared with the infinite trail of goals that they have left as a sign of their historical rivalry.

Lewandowski, Kane, Luis Suarez... There are many who have contributed to the growing number of goals, and the future, to the delight of the fans, is well tied up to continue this way. And if not, ask the boy named Haaland who goes around breaking records or that Frenchman named Mbappé who seems set to conquer the world...

 

June 1, 2020