curious how many away victories are being chalked up during the pandemic.
always mysterious that teams win or lose home or away, but this season in particular there seems to be a crazy amount of high scoring.
I dont have statistics to compare other seasons over the decades, but teams appear to thrive without the stress of home crowds screeching abuse for 90 minutes.
empty stadiums must lighten the load for many players.
turning up at an empty old trafford minus 75000 is clearly different for opposing teams. the scores today alone were funny, but not remotely similar to what's gone before.

Can only agree, there seems to be a lot of strange scores, loads of goals, not many draws?
Can only think the lack of a crowd is affecting players in different ways?

They’re all glorified training games, that’s why

I dont remember a glut of goals when the first games after lockdown were played to complete last season, in fact quite the opposite.

MDWat wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 05, 2020 8:43 am

They’re all glorified training games, that’s why

Yeah, I'd agree with this. You see players warming up or training before a 'proper' match and it's incredible what they can do. Just looks like at the moment, they're doing it in games too. Obviously mentally easier for a lot of them without 50,000 people howling at every pass that doesn't come off.

The only downside obviously is it's so boring as a spectacle. 9-7 in an empty stadium is less watchable than a 0-0 in a packed stadium.

Can't help thinking that Martial wouldn't have been sent off yesterday had there been a full house at OT. Empty stadia must be having an effect as must the lack of pre-season. Been a glut of bizarre results from the offset. There were three yesterday that were beyond odd.

MDWat wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 05, 2020 8:43 am

They’re all glorified training games, that’s why

Correct ! However we look at it and whoever is playing, the whole feel of everything is “ full on training game “ and home /away now means almost nothing as atmosphere , momentum and the help a crowd gives are the sum total of feck all ( sadly )

Not sure how accurate this is but does back up what I think we are seeing.

Not sure why managers don't mention it more tbh.
Explaining a defeat, if a manager said his side thrive on the support from their fans and miss the atmosphere of the crowd it takes pressure off players and makes fans feel important.
Kind of a win win that deflects from a poor performance may be.
Considering how well we did at the end of last season, it may be difficult for SD to explain tho.

We've not really had enough games without crowds to say with certainty that these trends are statistically significant (which, in itself is usuall and arbitrary term dressed up as scientific authority) but there definitely appears to be something different about football without crowds.

Apparently Graham Branch was always the best player in training. CHDAJFU?

You could also add to that the different kick-off times.. 8pm on Sat and Sun.. matches on Thursday.. could mess with players' routines ?
Browsing some of the European leagues there doesn't seem to be the same rush of goals as our PL.

Rowls wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 05, 2020 12:54 pm

We've not really had enough games without crowds to say with certainty that these trends are statistically significant (which, in itself is usuall and arbitrary term dressed up as scientific authority) but there definitely appears to be something different about football without crowds.

Apparently Graham Branch was always the best player in training. CHDAJFU?

Steve Jordon ( spelling could be wrong) always looked very good in training when I saw him. Great control and passing accuracy. It was like watching a different footballer on a Saturday.