Stat, Viz, Quiz is the Opta Analyst football newsletter. This week’s edition looks at Brentford’s home and away form, Cole Palmer’s penalties, and yellow cards.
As the literal winds of Storm Darragh swept through the United Kingdom over the weekend, the winds of change also somewhat blew across the Premier League.
Manchester City dropped more points at Crystal Palace; Nottingham Forest followed up their win at Anfield earlier this season with a victory at Old Trafford; and, despite Enzo Maresca’s insistence that his Little Team That Could aren’t title challengers, Chelsea (eventually) produced a statement performance at Tottenham to move up to second.
Cole Palmer was at the centre of that win for the Blues, scoring two more penalties, and in this week’s SVQ we’ll take a closer look at the England international’s ability from the spot.
We’ll kick off with Brentford, though, who won again on home soil on Saturday. Thomas Frank’s men have a great home record this season, but a significantly less good away record, which we’ll investigate further.
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STAT – Home and Away is Night and Day for Brentford
We all know that teams generally find it easier to win games at home than they do away.
There are several explanations, such as no travel fatigue, having the bigger dressing room, the familiarity of surroundings and of course the boost of having far more of your own fans in the stadium to cheer you on.
However, Brentford are taking the idea of home advantage to another level.
Thomas Frank’s side have only won a single point on the road this season, losing at Liverpool, Manchester City, Tottenham, Manchester United, Fulham and Aston Villa. They secured a draw last week at Everton, but that’s all they have to show from seven away trips in 2024-25.
At the Gtech Community Stadium, though, it’s a different story altogether.
Brentford’s 4-2 win over Newcastle United on Saturday was their seventh victory in eight home games this season in the Premier League, only dropping points in a 1-1 draw against West Ham. Frank’s Bees have vanquished Newcastle, Crystal Palace, Southampton, Wolves, Ipswich, Bournemouth and Leicester City.
That is quite the difference between home and away form. They average 2.75 points per game at home, and just 0.14 points per game away. That difference of 2.61 points per game is comfortably the greatest in Premier League history.
Across an entire Premier League season, Fulham have the biggest points-per-game difference between home and away results from the 2005-06 campaign. They averaged 2.16 points at Craven Cottage, compared to just 0.37 on the road (1.79 difference). Fulham won 13 of their 19 home games, but just one of their away games.
In terms of points difference, Leeds United don’t beat that total from Fulham, but in the inaugural Premier League season (1992-93) the Yorkshire side incredibly lost just one of their 21 games at Elland Road, but didn’t win once on the road, posting a PPG difference of 1.76.
Home vs Away Form Premier League history
It should be noted that Brentford’s home games have been a lot easier than their away challenges on paper. Bournemouth are the only team they have faced at home who are in the top half, while Spurs, Man Utd and Everton are the only teams in the bottom half they have faced away.
In the coming weeks they host Arsenal, Man City and Liverpool, while they travel to Southampton, Palace, West Ham and Leicester. Will things even out after that?
We’ll have to wait and see, but home comforts are at least keeping the Bees flying high for now.
VIZ – Palmer’s Perfect Penalties
Cole Palmer penalty locations
Jonathan Manuel / Data Analyst
In the 2018-19 FA Youth Cup final, Manchester City played Liverpool. After a 1-1 draw the game went to penalties. Liverpool won 5-3, with only one player failing to score in the shootout.
That was Cole Palmer… but it’s fair to say he’s certainly made up for that since.
The now Chelsea star was excellent again at the weekend, including scoring two penalties as Maresca’s side showed their fighting qualities and title credentials, coming from 2-0 down to beat Tottenham 4-3 on Sunday. It moved them ahead of Arsenal and into second in the Premier League.
It brought up all kinds of new landmarks for Palmer, who reached 50 goal involvements (33 goals, 17 assists) in 48 Premier League games for Chelsea; only Erling Haaland for Man City (39), Andrew Cole for Newcastle (43) and Mohamed Salah for Liverpool (46) have ever reached that total in fewer appearances for a club in the competition.
Top 10 - Player Graphic 6
He has also been directly involved in 38 goals in the Premier League in 2024 (25 goals, 13 assists); the most by a Chelsea player in a single calendar year in the competition.
Arguably most notable from Palmer, though, was that he has scored all 12 of his penalties in the Premier League, the most any player has taken in the competition without ever missing, surpassing Yaya Touré (11).
Unfortunately for Spurs fans, a quarter of those penalties have come against them (3/12). Palmer’s other successful spot kicks have come against Manchester United (2), Burnley (2), Arsenal, Fulham, Everton, Brighton and former club Manchester City.
As you can see from this week’s viz above, Palmer has mixed up his penalties, putting four to the goalkeeper’s right, six to the goalkeeper’s left, and two down the middle, including a delicious Panenka on Sunday that had Fraser Forster turning away in apparent disgust before the ball had even gone past him.
We’ve covered Palmer’s penalty perfection on the Opta Analyst website, arguing why some could consider him the best penalty taker in Premier League history.
Chelsea were famously called the “billion-pound bottle jobs” earlier this year when they lost the EFL Cup final to Liverpool.
Palmer and his pals are making that assertion seem more than misplaced now.
QUIZ – Haaland’s Hits, Forest Rockets, and Bournemouth Comebacks
It’s time to get those thinking caps on. Opta facts in the form of quiz questions are on the way. Answers at the bottom of the page.
1. Erling Haaland has scored six goals in four Premier League appearances against Crystal Palace, only netting more goals in the competition against two other teams. Name either of them.
2. Southampton (W1 D2 L12) are just the fourth side to have five or fewer points after 15 games in a Premier League season, after Sunderland (5 points in 2005-06), and which other team who have done so twice?
3. Since the start of last season, who are the only team to have scored more Premier League goals from outside the box than Nottingham Forest (15)?
4. Aged 37 years and 332 days, Leicester’s Jamie Vardy became the second-oldest player in Premier League history to both score and assist a goal in a single match, after who?
5. After coming back from 1-0 down to win against Ipswich, Bournemouth are the first team in Premier League history to be trailing as late as the 87th minute in two different away games they went on to win in the same season in the competition. Who else did they beat that late on this season?
Ask Opta
This week’s question comes from Barry F, who asks: “I’m sure referees are handing out more yellow cards this season. Do you have any numbers that show that?”
Do you have a stats-based football question you want to Ask Opta? If so, send it to editors@theanalyst.com and we’ll do our best to provide you with the answer in a future edition of SVQ.
Answer:
Whether it’s due to a lack of discipline, harsher rules, or a bit of both; yes, we are seeing a lot of bookings this season.
There have been 710 yellow cards shown in the Premier League in 2024-25 in 149 games, an average of 4.8 per game.
Last season, 1,602 yellow cards were handed out in 380 Premier League games, an average of 4.2 per game, with Chelsea breaking the competition record for most bookings in a single season (109).
The 2023-24 campaign was the first time the Premier League had averaged more than four yellows in a game, so yes, there are currently more bookings than ever.
For more on this, we asked in October if the Premier League needs to reconsider its suspension rules in light of this increase in card brandishing.
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Quiz Answers
1. Erling Haaland has scored six goals in four Premier League appearances against Crystal Palace, only netting more goals in the competition against two other teams. Name either of them.
Wolves (8 goals) and West Ham (7)
2. Southampton (W1 D2 L12) are just the fourth side to have five or fewer points after 15 games in a Premier League season, after Sunderland (5 points in 2005-06), and which other team who have done so twice?
Sheffield United (5 points in 2023-24 and 2 points in 2020-21)
3. Since the start of last season, who are the only team to have scored more Premier League goals from outside the box than Nottingham Forest (15)?
Manchester City (22)
4. Aged 37 years and 332 days, Leicester’s Jamie Vardy became the second-oldest player in Premier League history to both score and assist a goal in a single match, after who?
Ryan Giggs vs Fulham in December 2011 (38y 22d)
5. After coming back from 1-0 down to win against Ipswich, Bournemouth are the first team in Premier League history to be trailing as late as the 87th minute in two different away games they went on to win in the same season in the competition. Who else did they beat that late on this season?
Everton
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