Do Spurs and Vicario have a problem defending corners?
By Charlie Eccleshare and Chloe Morgan
6 February 2024
In the first half of Tottenham Hotspur’s 2-2 draw at Everton, it felt like there were two games going on. One when the ball was in open play, and one whenever Everton took a corner.
Sean Dyche’s side had six in the first half, and whether it was a Dwight McNeil inswinger from the right or James Garner doing the same from the left, the tactic was the same each time. Whip it with pace towards the head of Spurs goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario and get someone — usually Jack Harrison — to stand next to him and be as big a nuisance as possible without giving a foul away.
It was the same tactic that Manchester City had used to score their later winner in the FA Cup eight days earlier, when Ruben Dias had been in the Harrison role, and Nathan Ake had prodded home the loose ball. Spurs wanted a foul but none was given, further emboldening opponents to try this tactic against them. Brentford did something similar with Ben Mee with their first corner against Spurs in the game between the City and Everton fixtures.
More broadly, we’ve seen goals from similar situations at set pieces where goalkeepers have felt impeded in the Premier League in recent weeks. Woolwich scored a couple against Crystal Palace, while Carlton Morris headed in a late equaliser for Luton Town against Burnley after Elijah Adebayo had moved goalkeeper James Trafford out of the way.
On the flip side, Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson was adjudged to have been fouled against Manchester City in November when there didn’t appear to be much contact, creating a situation in which most people aren’t really sure of what constitutes a foul on the goalkeeper.
Vicario wanted a foul after conceding that first goal on Saturday, but the general consensus was that he didn’t have much of a case. “It just seems to be that referees are reluctant to call these now and will leave it to VAR to decide those decisions,” was Ange Postecoglou’s view. “We’ve just got to cop it.”
Spurs then conceded another goal from a set piece in the second half, this time from a free kick that saw Vicario stay rooted to his line and Jarrad Branthwaite bundle the ball home.
All of this has raised the question: do Spurs and Vicario have an issue when it comes to defending set pieces?
Zooming out a little, Tottenham generally have been one of the league’s better sides at defending dead balls this season. They have conceded six Premier League goals that way this season, with only six teams having conceded fewer. That said, they have the highest expected goals against (xGA) from set pieces of any team this season (10), per Opta, and the second-highest number of shots conceded from set pieces (107), suggesting the recent run of goals might have been coming.
It also suggests that Vicario adds a lot of value at set pieces as he’s keeping out so many more goals than he would have been expected to let in.
In general, it’s worth reiterating how outstanding Vicario has been in the Spurs goal since his arrival in the summer.
And perhaps there’s an element of recency bias with all of this, as Tottenham have conceded three set-piece goals in their last three games in all competitions, including two such costly ones at the weekend. It’s possible that, in a few weeks, this will be forgotten about.
But for the moment, how Everton got so much joy from the tactic — and had seen City successfully do the same thing to Vicario — has created a degree of concern.
Vicario did make some very capable claims and punches from corners on Saturday so it was by no means an entirely negative afternoon for him. But breaking down the two goals, there were issues he and the team need to address.
Starting with the first one, a number of things caught the eye of the former Spurs Women goalkeeper and The Athletic editor Chloe Morgan.
“Vicario’s initial position (below) is fairly central, which is good, but I was always advised to start about a foot off-centre (towards the back post) as it’s easier to come forward to claim than to backpedal if the ball is played long,” Morgan explains.
“When the ball is kicked, Vicario, mistakenly for me, takes a very small step forward. It’s an instinctive thing to do, but actually means you pre-judge the flight of the ball too early and increases room for misjudgement.
“When he does realise, he makes no movement to re-adjust and step back. Failing that, squaring up to the ball would probably be the best option (then you have the use of both legs to jump straight in the air and claim with both hands). It looks like initially that’s what he is going to do but he then changes last minute.
So what he actually does is go to take it with two hands, then he pulls a hand back and twists his body outwards and tries to get something on it. It almost looks as if he is sure he is going to save it and wants to make it as dramatic as possible, which then backfires.”
Part of the mitigation offered for Vicario is that Spurs continually let Harrison (or occasionally James Tarkowski) block him. In the coming weeks, you wonder if coaches Mile Jedinak and Matt Wells, who lead on defensive set pieces, will instruct one of the Tottenham players to go with whoever is blocking Vicario and be tasked with keeping him out of the Italian’s way.
While Spurs’ next opponents Brighton & Hove Albion aren’t thought of necessarily as a set-piece team, their only goal in this fixture last season was Lewis Dunk’s back-post header from a corner, with Hugo Lloris rooted to his line, as Vicario was at times on Saturday.
Take Everton’s second equaliser for instance, which was scored by Branthwaite from a few yards out, with Vicario stuck on his goal line.
“His starting position is fairly deep — well within the six-yard box,” says Morgan. “If you’re going to do that, I would possibly tell the defence to keep a higher line to protect the goalkeeper’s position and provide space to claim the first ball in. He does well to retreat back to his line once he’s made the decision not to come and claim.
“On the second ball after Romero’s header, he moves across the goal line and looks to be behind it when the goal goes in, instead of coming off the line to claim the header. It’s a looping ball going over the heads of players and he’s not so far away that he can’t at least fist or get fingers on it to tip it away.
“But when he’s still moving across the line he’s not able to affect any type of reach — you’ll notice his arms don’t go up at all and his body shrinks down.”
There are counterarguments, though.
Starting with that Branthwaite goal, John Harrison, head of data science at goalkeeper.com is more sympathetic to Vicario. “The decision not to come first of all is a fine one, and then Vicario does what you’re taught to do as a goalkeeper and maximise your reaction time for headers by getting tight to your line, because headers are slower than foot shots and if you position yourself too far off your line, you can give the attacking player a much easier finish,” he says.
“After Romero’s header, it becomes a race between him and Branthwaite and he just loses out. If he was that tight to his line and the cross had gone straight to Branthwaite without the Romero intervention, then it would be a really bad mistake on his part.”
More generally, data from goalkeeper.com suggests that Vicario has generally been pretty effective from corners this season (see graphic below). Their model shows that Vicario has made almost five more attempted claims than would have been expected from the average goalkeeper, and that 23 of those attempts have reduced the expected goals (xG) of the chance for the opposition, with only three increasing it. One of those three was for Everton’s opener on Saturday.
Harrison also points out that, as the graphic shows, teams have been dropping corners on Vicario’s head for weeks and he’s generally dealt well with them. Even on Saturday, Vicario made some good claims and punches, including just after half-time when other keepers might still have been reeling from that punishing first half, and one shortly before Branthwaite’s late goal.
As Postecoglou put it after the game, when it was suggested to him that those two set pieces showed what Everton were all about: “Yeah, but it wasn’t two set pieces, it was about 100 set pieces.”
“In general this season, some of what Vicario has done in these kind of situations has been a bit untidy but actually he’s proactive enough and his quality at catching things and punching into good areas has been good enough to outweigh the negatives,” Harrison says. “The worry is this trend from the last few weeks of him getting stuck under the ball and not being active enough around the man.”
There have also been times when Vicario has stayed too tight to his line and it could have cost Tottenham.
Against Nottingham Forest in December, Vicario made a brilliant save to deny Harry Toffolo from a corner. It was rightly lauded for the outstanding reflexes it displayed, but it was evidence of Vicario sometimes staying too tight to his line at set pieces.
He made a similar save on Saturday after staying on his line to deny Ben Godfrey, before kicking the ball away as Harrison tried to snaffle the rebound.
According to goalkeeper.com data, those two examples are the two highest-claim-probability corners Vicario has faced this season that he decided not to attempt to claim — 52 per cent claim probability in the Forest one and 39 per cent in the Everton one. This essentially means that the average goalkeeper would be expected to try and claim the ball 52 and 39 per cent of the time respectively.
Everton’s overall success on Saturday also reflects the fact that they are statistically the second-best team at attacking set pieces this season (their 13 goals are bettered only by Woolwich). Spurs and Vicario won’t be facing such a big threat from dead balls every week.
But they’ll need to get a handle on a potential weakness that their opponents will all now be very aware of. “If this habit continues and everyone tries to pin him, then it could become an issue,” Harrison says. “But he reacted really well to conceding the first goal on Saturday, and looked like it didn’t phase him. He wasn’t pinned at every corner after it. It was like he knew he was at fault for the first goal but then he took responsibility — it didn’t look like he was affected by it.”
Now Spurs need Vicario to react to the disappointment of conceding that second goal and prove these set-piece goals against are just an aberration.
Do Spurs and Vicario have a problem defending corners?
By Charlie Eccleshare and Chloe Morgan
6 February 2024
Sean Dyche’s side had six in the first half, and whether it was a Dwight McNeil inswinger from the right or James Garner doing the same from the left, the tactic was the same each time. Whip it with pace towards the head of Spurs goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario and get someone — usually Jack Harrison — to stand next to him and be as big a nuisance as possible without giving a foul away.
It was the same tactic that Manchester City had used to score their later winner in the FA Cup eight days earlier, when Ruben Dias had been in the Harrison role, and Nathan Ake had prodded home the loose ball. Spurs wanted a foul but none was given, further emboldening opponents to try this tactic against them. Brentford did something similar with Ben Mee with their first corner against Spurs in the game between the City and Everton fixtures.
More broadly, we’ve seen goals from similar situations at set pieces where goalkeepers have felt impeded in the Premier League in recent weeks. Woolwich scored a couple against Crystal Palace, while Carlton Morris headed in a late equaliser for Luton Town against Burnley after Elijah Adebayo had moved goalkeeper James Trafford out of the way.
On the flip side, Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson was adjudged to have been fouled against Manchester City in November when there didn’t appear to be much contact, creating a situation in which most people aren’t really sure of what constitutes a foul on the goalkeeper.
Vicario wanted a foul after conceding that first goal on Saturday, but the general consensus was that he didn’t have much of a case. “It just seems to be that referees are reluctant to call these now and will leave it to VAR to decide those decisions,” was Ange Postecoglou’s view. “We’ve just got to cop it.”
Spurs then conceded another goal from a set piece in the second half, this time from a free kick that saw Vicario stay rooted to his line and Jarrad Branthwaite bundle the ball home.
All of this has raised the question: do Spurs and Vicario have an issue when it comes to defending set pieces?
Zooming out a little, Tottenham generally have been one of the league’s better sides at defending dead balls this season. They have conceded six Premier League goals that way this season, with only six teams having conceded fewer. That said, they have the highest expected goals against (xGA) from set pieces of any team this season (10), per Opta, and the second-highest number of shots conceded from set pieces (107), suggesting the recent run of goals might have been coming.
It also suggests that Vicario adds a lot of value at set pieces as he’s keeping out so many more goals than he would have been expected to let in.
In general, it’s worth reiterating how outstanding Vicario has been in the Spurs goal since his arrival in the summer.
And perhaps there’s an element of recency bias with all of this, as Tottenham have conceded three set-piece goals in their last three games in all competitions, including two such costly ones at the weekend. It’s possible that, in a few weeks, this will be forgotten about.
But for the moment, how Everton got so much joy from the tactic — and had seen City successfully do the same thing to Vicario — has created a degree of concern.
Vicario did make some very capable claims and punches from corners on Saturday so it was by no means an entirely negative afternoon for him. But breaking down the two goals, there were issues he and the team need to address.
Starting with the first one, a number of things caught the eye of the former Spurs Women goalkeeper and The Athletic editor Chloe Morgan.
“Vicario’s initial position (below) is fairly central, which is good, but I was always advised to start about a foot off-centre (towards the back post) as it’s easier to come forward to claim than to backpedal if the ball is played long,” Morgan explains.
“When the ball is kicked, Vicario, mistakenly for me, takes a very small step forward. It’s an instinctive thing to do, but actually means you pre-judge the flight of the ball too early and increases room for misjudgement.
“When he does realise, he makes no movement to re-adjust and step back. Failing that, squaring up to the ball would probably be the best option (then you have the use of both legs to jump straight in the air and claim with both hands). It looks like initially that’s what he is going to do but he then changes last minute.
So what he actually does is go to take it with two hands, then he pulls a hand back and twists his body outwards and tries to get something on it. It almost looks as if he is sure he is going to save it and wants to make it as dramatic as possible, which then backfires.”
Part of the mitigation offered for Vicario is that Spurs continually let Harrison (or occasionally James Tarkowski) block him. In the coming weeks, you wonder if coaches Mile Jedinak and Matt Wells, who lead on defensive set pieces, will instruct one of the Tottenham players to go with whoever is blocking Vicario and be tasked with keeping him out of the Italian’s way.
While Spurs’ next opponents Brighton & Hove Albion aren’t thought of necessarily as a set-piece team, their only goal in this fixture last season was Lewis Dunk’s back-post header from a corner, with Hugo Lloris rooted to his line, as Vicario was at times on Saturday.
Take Everton’s second equaliser for instance, which was scored by Branthwaite from a few yards out, with Vicario stuck on his goal line.
“His starting position is fairly deep — well within the six-yard box,” says Morgan. “If you’re going to do that, I would possibly tell the defence to keep a higher line to protect the goalkeeper’s position and provide space to claim the first ball in. He does well to retreat back to his line once he’s made the decision not to come and claim.
“On the second ball after Romero’s header, he moves across the goal line and looks to be behind it when the goal goes in, instead of coming off the line to claim the header. It’s a looping ball going over the heads of players and he’s not so far away that he can’t at least fist or get fingers on it to tip it away.
“But when he’s still moving across the line he’s not able to affect any type of reach — you’ll notice his arms don’t go up at all and his body shrinks down.”
There are counterarguments, though.
Starting with that Branthwaite goal, John Harrison, head of data science at goalkeeper.com is more sympathetic to Vicario. “The decision not to come first of all is a fine one, and then Vicario does what you’re taught to do as a goalkeeper and maximise your reaction time for headers by getting tight to your line, because headers are slower than foot shots and if you position yourself too far off your line, you can give the attacking player a much easier finish,” he says.
“After Romero’s header, it becomes a race between him and Branthwaite and he just loses out. If he was that tight to his line and the cross had gone straight to Branthwaite without the Romero intervention, then it would be a really bad mistake on his part.”
More generally, data from goalkeeper.com suggests that Vicario has generally been pretty effective from corners this season (see graphic below). Their model shows that Vicario has made almost five more attempted claims than would have been expected from the average goalkeeper, and that 23 of those attempts have reduced the expected goals (xG) of the chance for the opposition, with only three increasing it. One of those three was for Everton’s opener on Saturday.
Harrison also points out that, as the graphic shows, teams have been dropping corners on Vicario’s head for weeks and he’s generally dealt well with them. Even on Saturday, Vicario made some good claims and punches, including just after half-time when other keepers might still have been reeling from that punishing first half, and one shortly before Branthwaite’s late goal.
As Postecoglou put it after the game, when it was suggested to him that those two set pieces showed what Everton were all about: “Yeah, but it wasn’t two set pieces, it was about 100 set pieces.”
“In general this season, some of what Vicario has done in these kind of situations has been a bit untidy but actually he’s proactive enough and his quality at catching things and punching into good areas has been good enough to outweigh the negatives,” Harrison says. “The worry is this trend from the last few weeks of him getting stuck under the ball and not being active enough around the man.”
There have also been times when Vicario has stayed too tight to his line and it could have cost Tottenham.
Against Nottingham Forest in December, Vicario made a brilliant save to deny Harry Toffolo from a corner. It was rightly lauded for the outstanding reflexes it displayed, but it was evidence of Vicario sometimes staying too tight to his line at set pieces.
He made a similar save on Saturday after staying on his line to deny Ben Godfrey, before kicking the ball away as Harrison tried to snaffle the rebound.
According to goalkeeper.com data, those two examples are the two highest-claim-probability corners Vicario has faced this season that he decided not to attempt to claim — 52 per cent claim probability in the Forest one and 39 per cent in the Everton one. This essentially means that the average goalkeeper would be expected to try and claim the ball 52 and 39 per cent of the time respectively.
Everton’s overall success on Saturday also reflects the fact that they are statistically the second-best team at attacking set pieces this season (their 13 goals are bettered only by Woolwich). Spurs and Vicario won’t be facing such a big threat from dead balls every week.
But they’ll need to get a handle on a potential weakness that their opponents will all now be very aware of. “If this habit continues and everyone tries to pin him, then it could become an issue,” Harrison says. “But he reacted really well to conceding the first goal on Saturday, and looked like it didn’t phase him. He wasn’t pinned at every corner after it. It was like he knew he was at fault for the first goal but then he took responsibility — it didn’t look like he was affected by it.”
Now Spurs need Vicario to react to the disappointment of conceding that second goal and prove these set-piece goals against are just an aberration.
(Top photo: Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images)
