Week 2

This week was about getting familiarized with Expected Goals (xG). I had read that expected goals are the probability of a goal being made based on multiple factors. These include, shot distance, shot angle, whether it was a header or kicked in, and many others. The article An Exploration of Expected Goals used the three factors I had mentioned. Expected goals could be counted through multiple games and/or seasons to gauge the attacking power of a team or player. This would eliminate the randomness in soccer/sports because it is able to quantify a team's scoring ability. The figure below comes from the same article mentioned earlier and is a representation of where shots were made and scored. This figure shows us that a majority of goals are made within the box and straight ahead of the goal. Based on this figure, one can assume that goals are made here because of the wide angle and short distance to the goal which increases the chances of a goal being made.

Credit: https://towardsdatascience.com/a-guide-to-expected-goals-63925ee71064