Vincent Kompany and the Burnley FC Striker Strategy

Introduction

I have never put pen to paper in this way in an attempt to explain something only to find that by the end of it, I had actually found out what I think is the real, different, answer!

Burnley FC

I have been a fan of Burnley FC since about 1970 and even though I am a nomad and have lived so far away from Turf Moor for most of my life since 1988, here I am still talking about them and watching them play in the English Championship every match with my Clarets+ subscription.

Vincent Kompany

Vincent is the new Burnley manager, having been appointed in the close season just gone. He comes into Burnley FC following the 10 year reign of Sean Dyche. Sean did a fabulous job for the Burnley FC family and everyone will for ever be grateful to him for his service. But Vincent is in charge now and, following his Manchester City career and his Anderlecht experience, we are happy to have him.

The start of the new season

The 2022/2023 season has started well: a victory, a draw, a loss, four point out of nine. But, so many new players, so many former players have left. This is a new season, a new manager and a new team. So things need to warm up.

Striker Talk

I follow Burnley on twitter and elsewhere but the Burnley twitterati have largely been as one voice so far this season in that we have watched the three games and said, after each one, bless him but Ashley Barnes isn't the striker we need just now. We need one or more strikers in the team to calm us down and to add to the goals we have scored: to have guaranteed the goals that we should have scored.

After the latest match, Vincent said, striker? Do we need a striker so desperately? I'm not worried, the goals will come. The team will work together and the goals will fly in.

That is where this article really started. I have looked into this before, three or four seasons ago: I researched the successes and failures of teams and their strikers and I found that successful teams need one or two guaranteed strikers and when other people score too, that's a bonus. Relying on the whole team, without having a gold standard striker is a problem. This weekend, that is not what Vincent said: he seemed to be saying the opposite.

The Evidence

I went to www.enfa.co.uk and pulled down the goal scoring records of the top two and two of the bottom two teams in the EFL for last season and the same for the Championship: clouded a bit by points deductions from Reading and Derby so not necessarily teams from the bottom three in that case. In the end, I am only using the EFL data that I put together.

I put together these stats for Manchester City, Liverpool, Burnley and Norwich City from the EPL

You can see the figures quite clearly. I thought it was going to be an easy job for me to announce how brilliant City was and how transparent their striker stats were. But look, The top three goal scorers scored just 39 of all league goals last season, whereas 54,  57.5% of Liverpool's goals, came from their top three. Norwich's top three provided 65% of their total goal overhaul: admittedly, Norwich's 23 goals pale into insignificance against City's 99 and Liverpool's 94! Burnley scored just 34 league goals last season.

We can see that about 40 - 50% of each club's players got the ball in the back of the net at some stage: 55.5% in the case of Burnley, with their relatively very small squad.

You can never go wrong with a few graphs so ...

Click on those graphs to enlarge them to see what I see, which is that City aren't always top dog, are they? I have to confess to being somewhat confused because it wasn't supporting my big idea that every successful club has two or three key strikers ...

Goals by Position

The enfa.co.uk database includes a complete list of players, their names and everything you expect to see about them, including their position on the pitch. It is here that I got my surprise and it was here that could well explain exactly what Vincent's striker strategy is. Look:

Where are the goals coming from?

LFC: Forward as well as midfield and the wing ... all three positions contributing heavily

Burnley: Forward and then a mixture

Norwich: Forward then a mixture

City: Midfield, the wing , central defence and then forward

What? Did everyone realise this but me? I have to confess, I don't pore over the league tables and stats like I used to but I got a big surprise when I found that City doesn't rely in a striker at all: only 8 goals from 99!

The graphs confirm all of this very nicely and I put City last to help to emphasise what I found.

The Conclusion

Have I found the holy grail of Turf Moor for this season? Is this what Vincent carries around with him post City? If it is and if it works out the way it worked for City, no one will complain, will they. After all, Burnley fans have taken Vincent and all of the new players to their hearts so far so if they can do at Turf Moor what the City lads are doing over there, were going to go all in!

Duncan Williamson

16/8/2022