I am planning to write more about this at some stage, but wanted to give you something to think about in the meantime. 

 

Possession stats have been seen as "worthless" for a long time now and the almost final nail in their coffin as meaningful, was when Leicester City won the Premier League ranked 18th for possession and that is often quoted. You rarely read that the other top 5 teams that season were all ranked top 4 for time spent with the ball. City were an anomaly and were also ranked last for passing accuracy that season for example. Oh and by the way, the Foxes have been relegated three times subsequently and sit 13th in League 1 this morning!

 

Teams can win games without the ball, we all know that, but it is hard to do that week in week out against quality opposition and it is certainly easier to score when you have the ball! Last season, 7 of the 8 teams with lowest possession averages finished bottom nine and the three lowest, were all relegated.

 

It is the low numbers I am mainly interested in and IMO, it is very tough to survive with less than 41% of the ball, at best with you are going to have a long relegation battle and in that regard, Coventry City with 39.2% possession and especially Hull City, who have only seen 32.2%, which is exceptionally low, are in trouble. The Tigers have started well and have been the early season surprise package, but I expect that to be less of a case going forward as opponents get more data on them. 

 

It is still early days, but we need to keep an eye on some "surging" or dropping numbers too. Brighton are up to 64.8% from 53.9% last season, only Manchester City have posted 63%+ post COVID and they won the league each time, so I would say that was (probably) unsustainable for the Seagulls, especially once they start playing regular European football, but it is worth monitoring and maybe they really are that good! Chelsea have clearly changed their style under Xabi Alonso and are down to 47.4% from last season's 57.7% and they had been happy to play without the ball and sit deep, but that worked less well against Leeds (first half) in the cup, Hull City and Brentford in their last three starts, who all sat off Chelsea, who struggled with all that "sudden" possession and Alonso and his team need a rethink over the international break.

 

Good luck!