Premier League Predictor
2021-2022 2nd Quarter Review January 14, 2022
2021-2022 PLP 2nd Quarter Review
We are officially halfway through the 2021/22 Premier League season! And that means it is time to check in and review what we have done over the past few months. While we are technically coming up on Matchweek 22, as of today there have been 191 matches played in the 2021/22 Premier League season. This means we are “officially”
just past the midpoint of the 380-game season!
The story of the winter Premier League months was obviously the impact of Covid on the season. With the new variant spreading rapidly, the Premier League saw its highest number of cases within teams and coaches. As a result, there were a ton of postponements over the “festive fixtures” period. These matches will be made up over the second half of the season, and we will be there to predict the outcomes!
Alex O. continues hold on to the #1 spot in the standings and it doesn’t look like he will give up that spot anytime soon! Alex moved into first place in Week 2 and has maintained his stranglehold on the top spot for the next 19 weeks. Here are the PLP Standings after Week 21:
Alex’s 4,970 points are slightly over the pace of our leader last season after 190 matches.
Last year, at this time our leader had 4,854 points, so Alex is on pace to put up one of the highest ever scores if he keeps this up.
The PLP Championship Probability metric really likes Alex’s chances to take home the PLP title - in just ten weeks we have seen Alex’s probability for winning the title improve from 13.7% to 23.4%. His current likelihood for winning the championship is far above any other player’s chances at this time. But, we know things can change quickly in the PLP game - a few good weeks can put any player into contention. Let’s look at how the PLP table is shaping up after the 1st half of the season:
The “Lead Pack” - (1) Alex O., (2) Tyler S., (3) Martin B.
The “lead pack” of Alex, Tyler and Martin have held their spots in the top third of the standings for most of the season. Alex has dominated the top spot, with Martin and Tyler each making some appearances in the 2nd place position, hoping that Alex will trip up before the end of the season. The results have been consistent for the top-3 so far, but they will need to keep the quality results coming if they want to fight off the challengers in the second half of the season!
The “Chase Pack” - (4) Jared G., (5) Zia C., (6) Dylan B., (7) Rory L.
Jared, Zia, Dylan and Rory form our “chase pack” and during the course of the season we have seen incredible charges up the standings from each of the players. Jared started slow in Week 1 but shot up the standings early in the year. Zia, Dylan and Rory all spent some time in 17th or 18th place before putting together amazing climbs toward the top of the standings. Now that the “chase pack” has reached places 4 through 7 in the standings, we will see if any of them can put together sustained charges into the top spots during the second half of the year.
The “Mid Pack” - (8) Sarut J., (9) Vidaur D., (10) Eli S., (11) Justin T. E., (12) Scott P.
The 1st-half trends for our “mid pack” players - Sarut, Vidaur, Eli, Justin and Scott - can really be described as tumultuous. We have seen some of the mid pack players make appearances at the top of the standings, some at the bottom, until settling in the middle of the table. We have seen some great scores from the mid pack players so far, but this group needs to put together a string of consistent results during the 2nd half of the season in order to make a charge for the regular season end-of-season prizes!
The “Back Pack” - (13) Shahir, A., (14) Ryan V., (15) Riley W., (16) Sam V., (17) Kendrick C., (18) Tyler G.
The season is certainly not over for the players currently sitting towards the bottom of the PLP standings! The first half of the season trended downward for most of the players in this group, but prior performances have no impact on future scores - a string of high scores can result in huge jumps up the standings! We have seen Zia, Dylan, and Rory do it earlier this year. None of the current scores are so insurmountable that we can’t see turnarounds over the second half of the season.
PLP Holiday Tournament
Typically, the review occurs after we have crowned a Holiday Tournament champion, but not this year! We have had some great competition over the holiday period - a few
“upsets” and some really close matches. But, Martin and Eli have outlasted everyone and will compete over the next two weeks for the first PLP prizes of the 2021/22 season!
Premier League Table
After the first 21 weeks of the Premier League season and 191 total matches played, here is the current Premier League Table:
The first half of the season has really been dominated by three teams - Manchester City, Liverpool, and Chelsea. The chart below illustrates the expected goal difference per game for each Premier League team over the course of the first half of the season. As you can see, based on their play so far this season, Manchester City, Liverpool, and even Chelsea are well above the rest when it comes to performance.
Those same three clubs have also dominated the “Big 6” matches during the first half of the season. Manchester City has taken a remarkable 13 out of 18 points off of the top 6 clubs in the first half of the season. With a record like that, it will be hard to imagine any other club taking home the Premier League title this season. Here is a table within the table, only made up of matches between the Big 6 teams:
If we take out the three dominant teams, it gives us a good picture of who is the best of the remaining 17 clubs. The two North London clubs - Arsenal and Spurs - have really struggled against the other Big 6 clubs, but have looked much better against the other, lower, Premier League teams. Here is an expected goals chart for the 17 remaining Premier League teams if we remove Chelsea, Manchester City, and Liverpool:
And, finally, we have the MESS that is the bottom-half of the Premier League table. In this group, the bottom 10 clubs just continue to beat up against each other. No club on this list has won more than 50% of the matches against the other bottom-half clubs.
Which makes these matches almost impossible to predict. Here is the Bottom-10 table:
My (subjective) 2nd Quarter Premier League Awards Match of the 2nd Quarter: Chelsea: 2, Liverpool: 2 (Week 21)
I’m not the best at picking the best matches of the season - and I’m sure that there were some really exciting matches that I am missing either because I forgot about them or wasn’t able to watch them. However, I don’t think there is too much wrong with picking an exciting draw between two of the top teams in the Premier League. Liverpool jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first half, but Chelsea responded with two quick goals with Christian Pulisic adding the tying goal just before halftime. There were some other great games in the last couple of months - check out the Honorable Mention if you think I missed the best match!
Honorable Mention: Chelsea: 3, Leeds United: 2 (Week 16)
Tottenham Hotspur: 2, Liverpool: 2 (Week 18) Arsenal: 1, Manchester City: 2 (Week 21)
Upset of the 2nd Quarter: Leicester City: 1, Liverpool: 0 (Week 20) (15%)
There weren’t a ton of upsets during the 2nd quarter of the Premier League season.
According to FiveThirtyEight predictions, Leicester City had just a 15% chance to beat Liverpool at home. And, according to the percentages, this was the biggest upset of the 2nd quarter. I really believe now that anytime Liverpool or Manchester City lose, it is going to be quite an upset. In this match, Liverpool outshout Leicester City 21 to 6, but it was only an effort from Ademola Lookman in the 59th minute that found the back of the net. Watford over Man U was also a huge upset!
Honorable Mention: Watford: 4, Manchester United: 1 (Week 12) (20%) West Ham United: 3, Chelsea: 2 (Week 15) (25%)
Team of the 2nd Quarter: Manchester City
It’s hard to argue with Manchester City being named as Team of the 2nd Quarter. Man City played 10 Premier League matches and won all 10 games with a goal differential of +24. A perfect 30 points during the holiday period. And after that stretch of results, it is hard to see any other team winning the Premier League title. Spurs also had a good stretch after the appointment of Antonio Conte as manager, and sit 3rd in the form table while playing just 7 matches. Liverpool were in their usual place towards the top of the form table. Aston Villa put together 4 wins during the holiday period, but were inconsistent. Here is the Form Table, showing the Premier League standings from Week 12 through Week 21:
Player of the 2nd Quarter: Diogo Jota (Liverpool) Apps: 9, Goals: 6, Assists: 1
This award could have easily gone again to Mo Salah, who continues to play incredible football this season. Likewise, it could have gone to Raheem Sterling, who put together a great December. However, I decided to highlight the play of Diogo Jota, who during this Quarter of the season has scored 6 goals and provided 1 assist in 9 matches. He was integral in Liverpool’s success during the holiday period, and will be required to step up his game even more while some of Liverpool’s stars are out for the African Cup of Nations. I also chose Jota because the “advanced metrics” show how valuable of player he is. If we look at the expected goals and expected assisted goals (not that I totally
understand how all of that is calculated), Jota has the highest performance of any player this year. Here are the top performing players this season using this metric, no real surprises when you look at who is on the list!
3rd Quarter Outlook
In normal years, the Premier League schedule kind of slogs through the winter months.
January through March can feel slow and disjointed, with interruptions due to the FA Cup and an international break. Teams will be struggling with injuries following the fast-paced schedule, and I’m sure Covid will still play its part during this next section of the season. This year, we are going to have a bunch of makeup matches due to the Covid postponements that occurred during the holiday period. So, maybe the additional games will make it move along a little faster.
Regardless, the next 9 weeks are important for the PLP season! All of the players will be hoping to make moves up the standings to prepare for the PLP Playoffs that kick off during Week 31 of the season. It’s an important couple of months to get through with some momentum! Here are some of the best Premier League matches that I wanted to highlight over the next 9 weeks:
Week 22: Manchester City v Chelsea Tottenham Hotspur v Arsenal
Week 23: Manchester United v West Ham United Chelsea v Tottenham Hotspur
Week 24: Brighton v Chelsea Wolves v Arsenal
Liverpool v Leicester City
Week 25: Manchester United v Southampton Chelsea v Arsenal
Leicester City v West Ham United Week 26: Crystal Palace v Chelsea
Manchester City v Tottenham Hotspur Wolves v Leicester City
Week 27: Arsenal v Liverpool
West Ham United v Wolves Brighton v Aston Villa
Week 28: Manchester City v Manchester United Liverpool v West Ham United
Wolves v Crystal Palace Week 29: Brighton v Liverpool
Crystal Palace v Manchester City
Manchester United v Tottenham Hotspur Week 30: Liverpool v Manchester United
Tottenham Hotspur v West Ham United Conclusion
This wraps up the PLP 2021/22 2nd Quarter Review! Although I know this is a lot, hopefully this provides some information to help you review the season so far, and also help you make picks moving forward! Who knows…
I am excited to give out the first prizes of the 2021/22 season in just a couple of weeks - good luck to Martin and Eli as they compete for the Holiday Tournament championship!
Finally, again, thanks to everyone for the great participation and competition so far this year! As always, let me know if you have any questions or suggestions to make the game better. Thanks for your participation so far this season, and good luck!
- Tyler
