Nothing is more frustrating than to see a shot on goal sail off into the stands. It seems like these happen so often, but does it? I thought it would be interesting to look at the total number of shots at goal, how often those are on target, how many are off target, and how many turn into goals.
Shots on target mean that a shot could have gone into the goal.Â
Shots off target means that a shot could not go into the goal, such as sailing way over the top of the goal or missing wide.Â
During that time, there were 6,303 goals. That’s a lot of goals!
Can you believe there were 55,458 shots on goal over the same period? That doesn’t seem so good when considering only 11.37% of those turned into goals. I will admit it might seem odd to take goals from overall shots. Why? Because the only shots on target have a chance to go in. However, it does tell you that just blasting a kick toward goals without much chance of going in only nets you an 11% chance of scoring. However, if you can get a shot on target, you have a 26.26% chance of it going into the goal. That starts to make things a lot more interesting.
What is the breakdown? This data comes from six Premier League seasons, 2017-2018 through 2022/2023:
Total shots on goal: 55,458
Shots off target: 31,452 or 56.71%
Shots on target: 24,006 or 43.28%
Shots that convert into goals overall: 11.37% (yikes!)
Shots that are on target to turn into goals: 26.26% (that’s much better)
The moral of the story is to focus on getting shots on target. It’s easier said than done, but you can see the level of impact if you shoot four shots on target; one is going in!
