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Everybody loves a long-range screamer. And it was not too long ago that a rocket from outside the penalty area felt like Wolverhampton Wanderers’ best chance of scoring a goal.
It was just last season, in fact, that Wolves were so devoid of creativity that a Ruben Neves strike from 20 yards or more often seemed like their biggest goalscoring threat.
Neves tried almost half as many shots from outside the opposition penalty area last season as the whole Wolves squad have attempted so far in this one — 51 compared to 106 — scoring twice from 18 yards or further out. So it is a significant turnaround that means, despite a much better season overall under new coach Gary O’Neil, Wolves are the only club in Europe’s five major domestic leagues yet to score a goal from outside the penalty area in 2023-24.
In many ways, the fact can be dismissed as a statistical quirk but it does, perhaps, tell us a little about the change in Wolves between last season and this — and it is not bad news. The average expected-goals (xG) value of a shot from outside the box in the Premier League season has been 0.04 — in other words, just a four per cent chance of scoring, and a reflection that most chances outside the penalty area are of particularly low quality.
And for Wolves, the picture has altered significantly since the changing of the guard in the playing squad in the summer and the arrival of O’Neil less than a week before their season started. In the most basic terms, they are creating a better quality of chance closer to goal, meaning long-range efforts are less of a factor in their game.
This season, just 31 per cent of Wolves’ shots have been taken from outside the box, representing the lowest share since 2018-19, according to data compiled ahead of the latest midweek round of Premier League games. That is just the 14th-highest percentage in the league. Last season, the figure was 38 per cent — third highest of the 20 sides in the division.
And maps of Wolves’ shots this season and last highlight the change clearly, with 33 per cent of their attempts coming from inside either the six-yard box or the ‘second six-yard box’ — the area immediately upfield from the actual one — compared to 27 per cent in 2022-23.
Wolves’ xG per shot figure has risen from 0.09 last season to 0.11, underlining the fact that the chances they are creating are of a higher quality, and their average shot distance has decreased, proving they have generally found a way to work the ball into better goalscoring positions.
And their change in personnel has played a part too — namely the summer departure of Neves, for whom long-range shots, often resulting in memorable goals, were a key feature of his six seasons at Molineux. Last season, only Alexis Mac Allister, then of Brighton & Hove Albion and now with Liverpool, took more shots from outside the box than Neves — 52 to 51.
Wolves have yet to find a natural replacement for Neves and the player in the current squad most likely to shoot from range, Tommy Doyle, has been an infrequent starter, with Mario Lemina and Joao Gomes often preferred in central midfield.
Matheus Cunha has tried his luck most often from outside the box with 20 efforts, 10 of which have been on target. Pablo Sarabia is next with 15 (six on target) while Lemina and Gomes are also into double figures with 13 and 11 respectively. Doyle and Pedro Neto have tried eight times each, with the remaining 31 efforts split between 11 other players.
Many of Wolves’ 106 shots from outside the area were close to resulting in goals. But so far, none of them have. Some, like the one from Doyle in the weekend defeat at Aston Villa, flashed just wide.
And there have been some smart saves from goalkeepers, like this from Djordje Petrovic to deny Doyle in Wolves’ 2-1 home win against Chelsea on Christmas Eve.
Doyle’s effort might have found the bottom corner had Petrovic not pawed it away.
The woodwork has not been Wolves’ friend, as Neto found out in the 2-1 win at Bournemouth in October and Hwang Hee-chan discovered when he skimmed the crossbar in a 3-2 defeat against Fulham in November.
Others have missed out on what could be described as technicalities, like Nelson Semedo’s strike from millimetres outside the box against Fulham, which went down as an own goal after a deflection off the visitors’ Tom Cairney that wrongfooted goalkeeper Bernd Leno.
Some were spectacular but fractions away from qualifying, like Jean-Ricner Bellegarde’s superb goal from millimetres inside the box in the 2-1 away defeat against Sheffield United.
And some shots have just been plain optimistic, like Cunha’s from inside his own half in the home defeat against Liverpool…
…that gave Alisson the easiest take he will have all season.
Wolves have scored from outside the penalty area this season but those goals have not come in the Premier League, with Doyle netting a screamer in the FA Cup at Brentford before Neto netted a skimmer from just outside the area in the next round against local rivals West Bromwich Albion.
They still have time to remove the unwanted tag of being the only side without a ‘screamer’ on this season’s league resume.
But if they fail, it will go down as more of an analytical oddity than a cause for concern.
