The first month of the 2018/2019 Premier League season is over for Manuel Pellegrini’s West Ham United and it ended with a third straight defeat on Saturday afternoon as they were beaten 3-1 by Unai Emery’s Arsenal, now, it’s time to crunch all the statistics from the entertaining Emirates Stadium encounter.
Possession
The first of the team stats that we are going to look at in our analysis is possession, the amount of the ball that each team saw in North London, on the day where Emery claimed his first victory as Gunners boss.
A landslide was expected in this area and we got one, the hosts dominating the possession with a highly-impressive 61.4 per cent to the Hammers’ lowest total of the campaign in 38.6 %, this very much reflects the end result of the clash.
Shots
It would be a London derby of many efforts on goal, where both goalkeepers were kept relatively busy as 30 shots in total were registered at a chilly the Emirates.
Despite the fact that the home team recorded 17 of those and the away side weighed in with 13, the visitors undoubtedly had the better of the chances and will be pleased with how much they managed to trouble a “Big Six,” defence, but wonder what could have been from those 13 attempts.
Shots On Target
With how wasteful West Ham’s forwards were in front of goal, it is no surprise that Arsenal’s strikers are a significant distance ahead of them in terms of our next statistic, shots on target.
While Pellegrini’s front men didn’t have too many fewer overall efforts than Emery’s, they only had half of the shots directedly on goal that their opponents did with five, they managed 10, a stat that Pellegrini will be sure to look at in his post-match post-mortem.
Pass Completion
Pass completion looks at the percentage of passes that were completed by each team and is one of the more eye-opening in our usual list of eight stats, an area where the Hammers haven’t fared so badly this summer.
But, Saturday would be different as they recorded their worst figures of the season (75.4 per cent), despite enjoying arguably their best performance, the sad truth is that when you are up against 85.1% pass completion with that number, getting a result becomes very difficult.
Key Passes
Our next figure is something of an anomaly for this form of analysis as there are usually just a handful of key passes made by the two Xls throughout a normal Premier League encounter, but this time around, there was a staggering 25.
This fits the blueprint of what was a match of very many chances, most of the visitors’ arriving early and the hosts’ coming later on as they asserted their dominance, the former achieved 14 and the latter 11, once again proving how different things could have been in North London.
Corners
Another stat that very much matches the eventual scoreline is corners won and it’s one that played into the Gunners’ hands, given their aerial advantage over the Irons.
The North London club had seven opportunities from the wide set-pieces to cause a faltering Hammers backline problems, but they never really took advantage, whilst the East London outfit could win just two, wasting both of them.
Clearances
The final two team statistics that we are going to look at are measures of the two outfits’ defences, something that has been under scrutiny for Emery’s and Pellegrini’s men in recent times.
The familiar pattern of the home side coming out on top continues in this section as they cleared the danger 27 times on Saturday afternoon, whereas, the opposition to them could only do so 24 times, though it must be said that neither back four covered themselves in glory.
Saves
One man who did his reputation no harm when returning to his ex-club was Lukasz Fabianski in orange in the Irons goal, as he kept his former teammates at bay no fewer than nine times.
When you compare that to the just four saves, less than half, made by his opposite number Petr Cech, that looks all the more impressive, although as we’ve touched on, the home strikers were on far better form than the away ones.
So, now that all the statistics have been well and truly crunched from one of the better statistical showings if the Pellegrini reign in Claret & Blue, can West Ham improve on those stats on Tuesday evening, when they clash with Neil Ardley’s AFC Wimbledon in the early rounds of the Carabao Cup? Join us once again after that tie, to find out.
