Premier League teams are in almost ideal position to go far in Champions League

Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City and Manchester United played in the Premier League this week without having to worry much about the final round of Champions League group games next week. They have already qualified for the knockout phase. Liverpool, City and United will go through as group winners. Chelsea could.

Eleven of the teams who will play in the round of 16 are already known. Put that way it sounds as though there is not a lot still to be decided. But there is.

Only five of the eight group winners have been determined, only two of the eight runners-up. Four teams have qualified but do not know whether they will finish first or second. Five out of 11 others will qualify.

Getting through is obviously the most important consideration. But how they get through matters as well. Teams who win their group generally do better in the knockout phase than teams who were runners-up.

I looked at the last 18 Champions League seasons – 2003-04 to 2020-21, all those completed since the current format was introduced.

Twelve of the teams who lifted the trophy had been group winners compared with only six who had been runners-up. Twenty-seven of the finalists had been group winners compared with only nine who had been runners-up. Group winners were three times as likely to reach the final and twice as likely to lift the trophy.

This is probably because the better teams usually won their groups anyway, and because group winners do not play each other in the round of 16, and because group winners in the round of 16 have home advantage in the second leg. Seventy per cent of group runners-up were knocked out in the round of 16.

Did the best teams have other, distinguishing characteristics? To try to find out, I went through the Uefa Champions League technical reports for the last seven seasons, 2014-15 to 2020-21.

Good teams had more possession than bad teams. Teams eliminated at the group stage averaged 46 per cent possession, teams knocked out in the round of 16 averaged 50 per cent possession and teams who reached the quarter-finals or beyond averaged 54 per cent possession.

This is perhaps not surprising. What might surprise some is that the extra possession of the more successful teams was in the areas where it can be of most use – in the attacking and middle thirds.

Teams eliminated at the group stage had the ball in their defensive third for 14 per cent of their matches. So did teams knocked out in the round of 16. And so did teams who reached the quarter-finals or further. There was no difference between teams of varying achievements when it came to possession in the defensive third. There were differences further up the pitch.

Teams eliminated at the group stage had the ball in the middle third for 24 per cent of their matches. That figure increased to 26 per cent for teams knocked out in the round of 16 and 28 per cent for teams who reached the quarter-finals.

Teams eliminated at the group stage had the ball in the attacking third for eight per cent of their matches. That figure rose to ten per cent for teams knocked out in the round of 16 and 12 per cent for teams who reached the quarter-finals.

The most successful teams had players who were able to work longer and more cleverly in dangerous areas. Overall they did not work harder. There was little difference in distances covered. If anything, less successful teams covered more ground than the most successful teams.

Teams eliminated at the group stage covered an average of 111 kilometres per game. So did teams knocked out in the round of 16. Teams who reached the quarter-finals or beyond covered an average of 110 km per game.

The long and the short of putting the ball in the net

It takes on average four passes and 12 seconds to score a goal in the Champions League. At least it did in the seven seasons from 2014-15 to 2020-21 according to the Champions League technical reports.

Of all the goals scored, 76 per cent were from open play, 24 per cent from set-pieces.

The total for set-pieces was made up as follows: penalties nine per cent, corners eight per cent and free kicks seven per cent. Throw-ins led to less than one per cent of all goals.

There were a lot fewer penalties than corners but for understandable reasons the strike-rate was a lot higher. Nearly eight out of ten penalties were converted. Only one out of every 40 corners led to a goal.

Data collectors can differ over whether a goal should be counted as following a corner or whether it should be counted in a subsequent phase of possession. By any definition, though, goals from corners are rare.

Watching a match in any competition I will sometimes see a stat flash up saying one team have not scored from their last 40 or 50 corners. It is not that unusual.

I will read reports saying one team put in a large number of crosses but did not score. This is not so unusual either. More goals are scored from crosses than from corners. Over the last seven completed seasons, crosses accounted for 17 per cent of all Champions League goals. But there were a lot more open-play crosses than set-piece corners. On average it took more than 60 crosses to score a goal.

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