The most dominant teams in the Championship have been revealed thanks to the use of expected goals.
Expected goals - for those who aren’t familiar with the stat - is a measure of the quality and number of chances that a team has had. Each goalscoring opportunity is given a value, or decimal percetange, based on the probability of the chance being taken.
Comparing that with expected goals against - the same as expected goals but for chances that they have conceded - shows how much teams dominate their opponents.
Bristol City were given a rude awakening on the opening weekend against Leeds United, losing 3-1 at Ashton Gate but Marcelo Bielsa's side are the runaway team in the Championship with an expected goals value of 9.9 this season - by far the highest value in the division.
Leeds’ value of 13.1 is almost twice as high as the league’s average (7.6) and three more than the next highest ranking team, West Brom, with 10.2. The Yorkshire side also have an expected goals against of just 3.5 which is again the lowest in the division.
That’s a difference of 9.6 goals in the Whites’ favour - the largest difference of any Championship side. Brentford come next with 5.1, followed by West Brom with 3.6.
City have a positive xG difference of 1.8 - 8.5 xG in favour and 6.7 xGA - and are ranked eighth overall in the division. Which also shows the Robins have overperformed a little in front of goal having scored 11 but also let in more than they should have with eight.
It's easy to write this off as meaningless maths against the reality of the league table, but xG is a statistic frequently cited by Lee Johnson as an indicator of a performance and is one the head coach regularly analyses and tries to improve.
When the values are plotted onto a chart it clearly shows just how dominant Leeds have been compared to other teams in the division.
