Player Shots

In response to comments that it would be helpful for this site to include more details about the shots taken by the U.S., I compiled a spreadsheet of all of the shots taken by the U.S. in 2009 up to the Brazil final (the necessary stats for the final still aren’t available yet).  Although the spreadsheet contains a substantial amount of data per shot, for the purposes of this page, we’ll briefly summarize its findings:

The somewhat grainy image below shows how each section of the attacking half has been categorized.

 

 The first letter represents ‘distance’ measured by the area in which the shot is taken:

• G — Goal Box
• P — Penalty Box
• O — Outside the Penalty Area

The second letter identifies the shooter’s ‘angle.’  For present purposes, we calculate that based on which vertical section the player is standing in, i.e.,

• G — Directly in front of the Goal
• W — Wide, i.e., along the endline
• B — Inside the lines of the goal box (if they were extended all the way across the field) but not directly in front of goal
• P — Inside the side lines of the penalty area (if they were extended all the way across the field) but not within the lines of the goal box.
• O — Outside the side lines of the penalty area.

So, a player taking a shot while standing in the goal box, directly in front of the goal, would have his location coded “GG” and another player standing outside the penalty area, but in front of the goal, would have his position coded “OG.”  I am going through the process of distinguishing left & right sides of the field, but in the interim this categorization should enable us to take a closer look at the types of shots that U.S. players are taking.

The table below summarizes all of the shots taken by the U.S. in 2009 (except for the Brazil final).   The columns are organized roughly from area best for scoring (GG) to area worst for scoring (OO).  For each player listed on the left, the table indicates a potential shot result and how many times it happened to the player’s shots taken in each region.  For shots that went “Wide” there are parenthetical notations indicating how wide the shot went:  (B) – b/n the goal post and the sideline of goal box; (P) – b/n sideline of goal box and sideline of penalty box; (O) – b/n sideline of penalty box and corner; and (S) – shot went out on a sideline.

Because the data is harder to come by for the Confederations Cup, most of the shots are grouped together as “Conf. Cup”  on this table.  I was able to attribute goals to their scorers, but the remaining shots will take more time.  Nevertheless, I trust you’ll find this information interesting.

		GG	GW	PK	PG	PB	PP	PW	OG	OB	OP	OO	Totals
Adu										1			1
	Saved									1			1
Altidore		3			1			1	2	1			8
	Blocked									1			1
	Goal	2			1				2				5
	High	1						1					2
Beasley					2				1	1			4
	Saved				2				1				3
	Wide (P)									1			1
Bocanegra		1			1								2
	Goal	1											1
	High				1								1
Bornstein											1		1
	Blocked										1		1
Bradley		1			2				2		3		8
	Blocked										2		2
	Goal	1			1				1				3
	Saved								1				1
	Wide (B)				1						1		2
Casey					2								2
	Blocked				1								1
	High				1								1
Ching					1	1		1	1	1			5
	High				1								1
	Saved					1			1				2
	Wide (P)									1			1
	Wide (S)							1					1
Clark									2	1			3
	Blocked								1	1			2
	Saved								1				1
Cooper						1			1				2
	Blocked								1				1
	Saved					1							1
Davies			1		1								2
	Blocked				1								1
	Goal		1										1
Dempsey			1		2	2	1		4	2	4		16
	Blocked						1		2	1			4
	Goal				2								2
	High					1			2				3
	Saved					1				1	2		4
	Wide (B)										1		1
	Wide (P)										1		1
	Wide (S)		1										1
Donovan			1	3	1	1	1		1	3	1		12
	Blocked						1		1		1		3
	Goal			3									3
	High									2			2
	Saved		1										1
	Wide (B)					1				1			2
	Wide (P)				1								1
Feilhaber									1				1
	Saved								1				1
Hejduk		1								1			2
	Goal	1											1
	Wide (P)									1			1
Kljestan				1		1			3	2			7
	Blocked								1				1
	Goal			1		1				1			3
	High								1				1
	Saved								1	1			2
Mastroeni									1				1
	Wide (P)								1				1
Onyewu						1							1
	Wide (P)					1							1
Pearce											1		1
	Wide (B)										1		1
Rogers									1				1
	Blocked								1				1
Rolfe										1			1
	High/Wide									1			1
Thorrington									2				2
	Blocked								1				1
	Wide (P)								1				1
Torres									1				1
	Wide (S)								1				1
Conf. Cup		2	2		3	4	4		9	7	4	1	36
	Blocked				1		1		3	2			7
	High	1	1		1	2			2		1		8
	Saved					1	2		3	2	1		9
	Wide (B)	1	1		1				1	3	2		9
	Wide (P)					1						1	2
	Wide (S)						1						1
Totals		8	5	4	16	11	6	2	32	21	14	1	120

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