Can Ange Postecoglou's class overwhelm the rest of Celtic's 'expected trophies' equation?

However, to get there, Celtic will be forced to vanquish last season’s heroic double cup winners, St. Johnstone. How confident or nervous should we all be?

St. Johnstone have deservedly received widespread praise for their accomplishments last season, which were truly incredible given the club’s financial resources. The team offered tremendous performances, with players leaving it all on the pitch in impressive semi-final and final victories. It was only in the League Cup semi-final versus Hibs where St. Johnstone did not outperform their opponent per xG, which they redeemed with a dominant xG advantage in the final four months later.

But how good have St. Johnstone been so far this season, and how do they compare with Celtic?

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As usual, I’ll revert back to my trusty Expected Trophies concept, where St. Johnstone have less than 10% of Celtic’s wage bill – they are truly David versus Goliath from a financial perspective. According to Transfermkt, St. Johnstone have not paid a transfer fee to acquire a player since prior to the 2009-2010 season, when they spent a combined £157k on three. These radars compare chance creation and shot metrics for last season versus this season so far on the left, and then on the right just the first 13 games of last season.

The disparity is significant. From open play so far this season, only Motherwell and Livingston have created less xG, while overall non-penalty xG has been down about 41%. St. Johnstone started last season off with relatively poor results, but their underlying performance metrics suggested things were likely to improve. In contrast, this season their poor results have largely been reflected in underlying metrics. Here are trendlines since the start of Callum Davidson’s tenure for last season and this one to date.

Last season, St. Johnstone were able to perform with relatively consistently, whereas so far this season the trend has been towards lower chances created and more conceded. Is this due to bad luck, poor form, or has Davidson lost his touch?

While St. Johnstone continued their recent history of free transfers and loan signings, they made two large sales in Ali McCann and Jason Kerr, for a combined £1.89 million in proceeds. In fact, the only other two sales from 2009-2010 until the present prior to those two were Stevie May for £900k and Matt Kennedy for £80k. One could reasonably expect it may be difficult to replace such players for a team of St. Johnstone’s resources. Here is a radar comparing McCann’s limited minutes prior to his sale with those of a “replacement” in Cammy MacPherson:

While a small sample size, we can see that when it came to defending and pressing metrics, McCann was performing at a high level and MacPherson has so far struggled comparatively.

With the proceeds of the McCann and Kerr sales being roughly around the amount one may expect from 4,000 season tickets, it may be reasonable to presume that the sales were used to solidify club finances rather than fund a higher wage bill. It also appears that recruitment has not yet been effective at replacing the quality lost.

Now let’s have a look at Celtic’s progression season over season:

Last season predictably showed negative trends, as chance creation waned and chances conceded increased. Conversely, this season has what I’d argue have been counterintuitive trends given common narratives.

Chance creation has been on the wane since the explosive early introduction of “Angeball,” while chances conceded has been trending to an extremely low level despite widespread vilification of team defending. On a season-long basis so far, non-penalty xG difference has been 1.78 versus just 1.01 last season, and even compares favourably to the 1.55 difference for the abbreviated 2019-2020 season.

So, St. Johnstone has been struggling and Celtic have been performing well overall. One of St. Johnstone’s biggest weaknesses also may be likely to be amplified by a Celtic strength - limiting chances from open play, where xG conceded from open play has been just 0.36 on average so far.

In the October 23rd matchup, Celtic won 2-0 with xG at 2.58 versus 0.12 for St. Johnstone according to Statsbomb. However, Kyogo did not start that game, and 2.12 of Celtic’s xG came after he was subbed into the game around the 61st minute. St. Johnstone had just 0.05 xG from open play. Despite the narrative about St. Johnstone being a good cup team last season, my assessment is that Saturday could be relatively comfortable for Celtic assuming Kyogo starts.

I do not normally do “game previews,” as they are done at a high level by other talented people on this site. While I believe this matchup heavily favours Celtic, it also offers me an opportunity to revisit this analysis within the context of the Expected Trophies concept, and the importance of narratives.

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Callum Davidson understandably enjoyed widespread plaudits for St. Johnstone’s cup performances last season, yet as shown above, team performance levels have been poor and trending in the wrong direction. Team accounts for this season will not be released for many months, but given the pandemic and no players signed for transfer fees, I suspect St. Johnston’s wage bill has remained stable despite the two big players sales.

Within the context of the Expected Trophies framework, St. Johnstone suffering significantly from losing two of their best players makes sense. Replacing Kerr and McCann with comparable talent and system fit to Davidson’s playing style would be a difficult challenge with a team well resourced in recruitment, let alone one without such a track record. As an outsider, information is limited and that leaves supposition, but my best guess is that Davidson and the team have been victims of a downturn in their Expected Trophies model:

Wage Bill similar + Insufficient Recruitment to replace talent drain + Manager same = lower xTrophies

Celtic offer a very interesting contrast, as my assessment to date is as follows:

Wage Bill materially lower + Insufficient Recruitment to replace talent drain + Manager new = ?

How will this all shake out? Despite the tremendous performance levels of some individual players like Kyogo, the net departure of talent from last season has been significant. Squad depth has been eviscerated. Yet, team performance levels have been excellent overall.

As chronicled in another recent column, I believe last season’s performance levels were impaired by a series of identifiably poor decisions by the former manager as to how he utilized the considerable player resources at his disposal. The combination of incoherent recruitment and poor managerial decisions resulted in a significant drop in xTrophies.

Conversely, so far this season, Ange Postecoglou has been left to bootstrap together a starting XI at times with a razor-thin squad, including a significant number of injuries to key players. For Celtic to have been performing at the levels produced so far has been very impressive.

I typically argue that in modern football operations the role and importance of the head coach is far less important than common narratives. However, the past two seasons at Celtic offer a noticeable contrast between how really poor decisions made last season overwhelmed a high level of resources and talent and with this season really good decisions overcoming a significant drop in resources and talent.

Making the December cup final would be a welcome accomplishment following the relative despair of last season. Many journalists and football supporters from Australia and Japan were effusive in support of Ange and his managerial talent upon Celtic’s accidental hiring in June. As far as I can tell with the available evidence to date, they were right.

The remaining question is whether his considerable talents will be enough to overwhelm the rest of the equation?