Tottenham are 17th with a positive goal difference. Is this unique?

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Try telling any Tottenham Hotspur supporter that their club has enjoyed a positive Premier League campaign and they’ll doubtless think you’re winding them up. But it is, in one sense, positively true.

Despite lying in 17th, and being fortunate that the bottom three clubs have been completely hopeless, Tottenham have a positive goal difference of +4. It’s a higher goal difference than Brighton & Hove Albion, who are eight places higher in the table and have won 17 more points. It seems statistically unlikely that Tottenham have scored more than they’ve conceded and yet have lost nearly twice as many matches as they’ve won — 20 to 11.

Is this simply statistical trivia? Or does it say something about Ange Postecoglou’s side?

As you’d expect, the relationship between goal difference and points is fairly solid. Liverpool have won the most points and recorded the highest goal difference this season. Southampton are the opposite in both respects.

The same applies to the (nearly) 33 seasons of the Premier League era: the best points tally (100) and the best goal difference (+79) were both recorded by Manchester City in 2017-18, while the team who recorded the lowest points tally (11) Derby County in 2007-08, also had the worst goal difference (-69), although this was equalled by last season’s wretched Sheffield United side.

All this is very straightforward. But the interesting elements come when there are major outliers.

The strangest anomaly were Norwich City in the inaugural Premier League campaign. They were genuine title challengers for much of 1992-93, finishing third. They did so, remarkably, with a goal difference of -4. On average, a -4 goal difference has otherwise resulted in an 11th-placed Premier League finish. The ‘secret’ was that 16 of Norwich’s 21 league wins were by a one-goal margin, whereas they suffered heavy away losses: 7-1 against Blackburn Rovers, 5-1 against Tottenham, 4-1 against Liverpool, and 3-0 against Southampton and Wimbledon.

Notably, all those heavy defeats came away from home. Norwich offered, by the standards of the time, a commitment to brave passing football that didn’t seem to work on the road when home advantage played a bigger role in football compared to today, and many teams played for a draw on their travels. Besides, away trips from the relatively isolated city of Norwich, before players were accustomed to luxury travel, were somewhat arduous.

But Norwich seems an isolated case. The other sides who recorded good finishes despite a mediocre goal difference tended to be cautious, cagey teams. The only noteworthy example came when David Moyes’ Everton finished in fourth in 2004-05 despite a goal difference of -1, although that figure is slightly skewed by a 7-0 thrashing by Arsenal in their penultimate game, when they were already assured of a spot in the Champions League qualifiers. Harry Redknapp’s West Ham United, meanwhile, finished fifth in 1998-99 with a goal difference of -7.

As for the other end of the scale, has anyone ever finished as low as Tottenham’s current position while also having a positive goal difference? Well, no — as the below graph shows.

The closest case were the Manchester City side of 2003-04, managed by Kevin Keegan, who finished 16th with a +1 goal difference. That works neatly, because Keegan was, perhaps, the Postecoglou of two decades ago, favouring all-out attacking football with little regard for the situation in the game.

City endured a run of 14 games without a win midway through that season (although they recorded possibly the most memorable comeback in FA Cup history during that period, winning 4-3 at Tottenham with 10 men, having been 3-0 down at half-time), but a 5-1 win against Everton on the final day pushed their goal difference into positive numbers.

Everton of 1999-2000 are also noteworthy, finishing in 13th despite a healthy +10 goal difference. This owes much to thumping home wins against the division’s minnows.

There has been an element of randomness about Tottenham’s numbers this season. Maybe the league table does lie a little. Earlier in the season, there was a five-game run when Tottenham recorded a trio of three-goal wins (against Manchester United, West Ham and Aston Villa) alongside one-goal defeats (against Brighton and Crystal Palace).

Ideally, Spurs would have shared their goals across the games more evenly. In the comfortable wins against West Ham and Villa, they significantly overperformed their expected goals tallies — the pattern was more about inconsistency in terms of finishing rather than performance.

But it’s also surely about a lack of tactical nuance. Postecoglou has varied his system more than critics have suggested, but his commitment to open football, almost whatever the circumstances, has often left Tottenham exposed.

Goal difference can be seen as a good indicator of a side’s natural footballing ability, whereas the points tally, in relation to goal difference, is a good measure of how canny a side is — how strategically clever they are, how they can squeeze out results.

Postecoglou might leave at the end of the campaign, and his two-year spell will inevitably be linked to Tottenham’s result in the Europa League final. But should he achieve this odd and unwanted record — the lowest Premier League finish for a side with a positive goal difference — it will somehow feel fitting.

(Graph: Conor O’Neill)

(Top photo: Ange Postecoglou by Ben Whitley/PA Images via Getty Images)

This news was originally published on this post .

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