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So I wake up Saturday morning buzzing for the big clash, Man City versus Arsenal. Big game energy all over the place. Grabbed my laptop before breakfast, gotta dive into the numbers everyone’s gonna be shouting about later. Honestly, just wanted to see if the hype was real.
Starting Simple & Running Into Walls
First thing I did? Opened my usual stats app. Typed in “Man City”, typed in “Arsenal”, pressed enter. Easy peasy, right? Wrong. The thing straight-up froze. Spun that little loading circle for like five minutes. Tried again. Same thing. Felt like yelling at the screen. Guess everyone had the same idea, servers were getting hammered.
Switched tactics. Opened a blank spreadsheet instead. Old school rescue mission. Started manually looking for numbers myself across different footy sites. One tab for City passing stats, another for Arsenal tackles, one more for shots – felt like I was juggling cats.
Digging Deeper & Finding Gems
Saw some passing accuracy number floating around – something crazy high. 97%? No way. Had to track down the source. Finally found it buried in some detailed match analysis section on this serious stats site. Turned out it was Rodri’s completion rate for passes over 25 yards! Mind blown. That’s a whole different story than just “team passed well”.
Then, stumbled upon this number about possession regained. Arsenal kept popping up high in their own attacking third! The graphic wasn’t working, though. Just blank space. Had to click through three different team-specific analysis reports to find the actual count for Odegaard. Why make it simple?
- Spreadsheet crashed once. Lost about 10 minutes’ work. Classic rage moment.
- Baby spilled apple juice near the laptop. Near-disaster averted.
- Family calling “dinner’s ready!” right when I found the craziest stat. Of course.
The Shocking Bits & The “Wait, What?” Moment
The total passes everyone was quoting? Sure, looked massive. But here’s the kicker: it was actually the lowest possession number for Pep’s City in a home league game since 2016! Everyone was banging on about City passing endlessly, but the real story was Arsenal pinning them back.
And the corner count? Everyone was sharing “City had 15 corners!”. What nobody was shouting about? Not a single one led to a direct shot on target for nearly an hour! Found that buried in a micro-stat timeline. Felt like detective work.
Most jarring thing? Comparing expected goals maps side-by-side. The visuals showed City’s positions looked scarier, red zones all over. But the actual value? Their xG total was only like 0.3 higher than Arsenal’s from one main chance. The map made it look like a slaughter. The number told a different, tighter tale.
Wrapping Up & Feeling Done
Took all afternoon, way longer than I thought. My spreadsheet looked like a warzone. Highlighted cells, random notes like “RODRI – LONG PASSES INSANE”, and coffee stains everywhere.
Showed my brother the final collection before posting. His reaction? “Wait, so Arsenal basically bossed the stats but everyone thinks City battered them?” Exactly my point! All those big numbers flying around? Need context like crazy. Felt good figuring out the why behind the wow.
Ended it tired but smug. Posted my breakdown online. Then my brother calls later… turns out he bet on City purely because he saw that corner count plastered everywhere. Lost money. Maybe should have read deeper. Stats. Can make you look clever… or stupid.