Premier League Matchday 31 Rundown

With the international break over, the Premier League returned for matchday 31, the start of the eight-straight week run to the end of the season. Tottenham put on a great display, while Chelsea suffered a shock loss to Brentford.

 

The Premier League returned this weekend after the international break for Matchday 31. It's the start of the run to the end of the season, with a game week every weekend now until May. 

This weekend saw the continuation of the high goal scoring we got in March, with a six goal and a five-goal game.

It wasn’t just goals, though. There were a number of good things about this matchday just gone. Here is a quick rundown of how things went over the weekend.

 

Note: This article was written prior to the Crystal Palace vs Arsenal match on Monday night. As such, all the data and stats are correct for the weekend games only and do not include Monday’s match.

 

Goals: 25

25 goals over the nine games this weekend averages out to 2.78 goals a game, which, let's say we round up to three goals a game, usually means it was a good contest.

There were four games that matched or exceeded that 2.78 goal per game rate, with two of them greatly exceeding it; Chelsea vs Brentford finished with five goals, Tottenham vs Newcastle finished with six.

 

xG: 26.3

Unfortunately, though, as good as the weekend was for goals, matchday 31 did underachieve by its collective expected goal rate. Not by much, but it is still underachieving.

We can blame Brighton mostly for that. They had a 2.8 xG rate, pretty much right on track with the weekend average for goals per game, yet they didn’t find the net once. Their match against Norwich finished 0-0, the only goalless draw of the weekend.

 

Save percentage: 87%, David Raya (Brentford)

David Raya put in a sublime performance as Brentford pulled off a surprise victory over Chelsea. 

The Spaniard faced eight total shots on target, making seven saves to give him an 87% save percentage.

Raya outdid himself in the game. He has a save percentage season average of 76.3%, so he greatly exceeded that in this game. 

This season through 17 games, he has faced 4.47 shots on target per game while saving 3.41, so he has really overachieved in this sensational victory of the Blues.

 

Pass accuracy: Tottenham, 90% (554 of 616)

Tottenham were in fine form against Newcastle and with their strong win, they find themselves currently occupying a Champions League spot in fourth place (Arsenal are still yet to play but would retake fourth with at least a draw).

No one passed better than Spurs this weekend. Manchester City attempted and made the most passes, with 693 made from 788 attempted, which is an 88% pass accuracy rate. But, unless the order of numbers has changed, 90 is higher than 88, so that puts Tottenham over the league leaders this weekend.

 

Best team performance: Tottenham

And it’s Tottenham again! Their 5-1 win over Newcastle is our best team performance of the weekend.

Four goals added to their goal difference and the victory has meant they have jumped above Arsenal into fourth place in the league.

As mentioned before, Spurs had the best pass accuracy of any team this weekend. But the goals and the passing aren’t the only impressive stats from their game.

Tottenham dominated possession, boasting 61% of it, and had 711 total touches. They had 19 shots in total, with six of them finding the target for a 32% shot on target rate, and a 83% conversion, with their five goals scored from six shots on target.

It wasn’t all attacking, though. They put on a strong defensive performance, too, making 21 tackles and five interceptions.

 

Best player performance: Son Heung-min 

From Spurs’ fantastic performance, one player shone the brightest - Son Heung-min. Throughout this season he has been their best player, the go-to man when in need of creating something or getting things started.

And once again, Son stepped up. He got himself a goal and assist in the game, but taking a further look into his production shows the impact he had in the victory.

Son took four shots during the game, with two hitting the target. Both of those numbers are up on his season average, where he averages 2.51 shots per 90 mins and 1.23 shots on target per 90 mins.

He had a superb passing game, too, making 29 of his 32 passes, giving him a 90.8% pass accuracy. Again, he exceeded his season average of 77.5% for this stat. 

Son also had six shot creating chances and two goal creating chances. Once again, he was up on his season averages for both. He averages 3.90 shot creating actions per 90 mins and 0.42 goal creating actions per 90 mins this season.

Overall, Son had a very solid game, one that he greatly overachieved in almost all statistics, and that is why he is our Player of the Matchday.

 

Surprise result: Chelsea 1-4 Brentford

Earlier in the season, Chelsea was at the top of the table with a decent size lead. They were rightfully one of the favourites to win it and, let's not forget, they are reigning champions of the Champions League.

So a loss to Brentford is rather comical, made even funnier by the fact that it was at the Blues home of Stamford Bridge.

It wasn’t like it was a Brentford masterclass, though. The result from a statistic look shows a game in which Chelsea dominated, but through Brentford’s superb goalkeeping display (see earlier), they held Chelsea to just one goal while scoring four themselves.

Chelsea had 70% possession, made 606 of their 689 passes for an 88% pass accuracy rate, while Brentford’s was a low 72% with just 215 of their 300 passes finding their target.

Chelsea also had 21 shots in total, with eight on target to give them 35% shot accuracy, but with only a 12.5% conversion rate.

Brentford had 17 shots with six on target for a 35% shot accuracy rating, but a 66.6% conversion rate.