Analysing Last Season’s Clean Sheets

The aim of this article is find out which fixtures gave us the most clean sheets last season, and to translate this information into an unbiased set of rankings that can be imported into the FFS Member's Ticker.

Which fixtures did each team register a clean sheet in?

(Ordered by No. of Clean Sheets – Descending)

17. Manchester United: SOT, hul, liv, BUR, TOT, wba, whu, HUL, lei, WAT, WBA, sun, CHE, bur, mci, sot, CPL

17. Spurs: CRY, stk, SUN, MCI, bou, SWA, HUL, CHE, WBA, sun, MID, STK, bur, WAT, BOU, cry, ARS

16. Chelsea: BUR, hul, LEI, MUN, sot, EVE, mid, WBA, sun, cpl, BOU, lei, HUL, eve, MID, wba

14. Southampton: SWA, whu, lei, LIV, EVE, MID, stk, LEI, sun, BOU, wba, HUL, liv, MUN

13. Everton: STK, sun, WHU, lei, SOT, MCI, cpl, mid, SUN, WBA, HUL, whu, WAT

13. Arsenal: lei, CHE, bur, MID, WBA, CPL, swa, HUL, WHU, LEI, MUN, sot, SUN

12. Liverpool: MUN, sot, SUN, mid, eve, MCI, TOT, wba, wat, SOT, whu, MID

12. Man City: BOU, wba, WAT, hul, whu, bou, sun, STK, sot, MUN, CPL, wat

11. Middlesborough: wba, ars, BOU, HUL, SWA, LEI, wat, EVE, swa, BUR, SUN

11. Stoke: SUN, hul, wat, BUR, SOT, WAT, CPL, MID, mci, WHU, sot

10. Bournemouth: WBA, EVE, TOT, stk, LEI, swa, SWA, sot, MID, sun

10. Burnley: LIV, WAT, mun, MID, SOT, LEI, sun, STK, mid, cpl

10. West Ham: BOU, cpl, SUN, BUR, HUL, CPL, SWA, EVE, stk, TOT

9. Leicester: ARS, BUR, SOT, WHU, mid, STK, SUN, wba, WAT

8. Swansea: bur, WAT, SUN, LEI, MID, STK, EVE, sun

7. Palace: SOT, bou, MID, wba, WAT, ARS, HUL

7. Watford: mid, swa, HUL, MID, SUN, WBA, SWA

6. Sunderland: HUL, WAT, TOT, cpl, BUR, hul

6. West Brom: cpl, MID, BUR, SUN, STK, mun

5. Hull: swa, mun, LIV, WAT, sot

How many Clean Sheets did each fixture yield?

11 = HUL, MID, WAT

10 = SUN

9 = sun

8 = sot, wba

7 = WBA, SOT, STK, LEI, BUR, cpl

6 = SWA, BOU, CPL, EVE, MUN, mid

5 = TOT, bur, hul, lei, swa, whu

4 = WHU, stk, wat

3 = ARS, CHE, LIV, MCI, bou, mun

2 = eve, liv, mci

1 = ars

0 = che, tot

Total clean sheets from HOME fixtures: 130
Total clean sheets from AWAY fixtures: 84

Equivilent FFS Ticker Ratings 

The relegated teams are removed from this section of the analysis

The ticker fixture ratings range from 950 to 1350. Therefore if we set the most lucrative fixture at 950 (WAT) and the two fixtures which yielded zero clean sheets at 1350 (che, tot), we can create a trendline between the two points and equate each clean sheet total to a rating.

The trendline found is -36.364x + 1350 where x is the number of clean sheets the fixture yielded.

This equation produces the following ratings for each fixture:

Home Ratings:

Arsenal: 1241

Bournemouth: 1132

Brighton: n/a (Recommended: 950)

Burnley: 1095

Chelsea: 1241

Crystal Palace: 1132

Everton: 1132

Huddersfield: n/a (Recommended: 950)

Leicester: 1095

Liverpool: 1205

Man City: 1241

Man United: 1132

Newcastle: n/a (Recommened: 950)

Southampton: 1095

Stoke: 1095

Swansea: 1132

Tottenham: 1168

Watford: 950

West Brom: 1095

West Ham: 1205

Away Ratings:

Arsenal: 1314

Bournemouth: 1241

Brighton: n/a (Recommended: 1023)

Burnley: 1168

Chelsea: 1350

Crystal Palace: 1095

Everton: 1277

Huddersfield: n/a (Recommended: 1023)

Leicester: 1168

Liverpool: 1277

Man City: 1277

Man United: 1241

Newcastle: n/a (Recommened: 1023)

Southampton: 1059

Stoke: 1205

Swansea: 1168

Tottenham: 1350

Watford: 1205

West Brom: 1059

West Ham: 1168

1023 is lowest value of any away fixture last season, bestowed to the mighty Sunderland.

What is this nonsense?

Good question. Well, if you enter these values into your member's tickers you end up the perfect clean sheet ticker for last season. Each value is perfectly weighted to represent the amount of clean sheets it produced. It's beautiful!

However, a lot will change this season. We have new managers, new signings, and three new teams.Therefore, it may require your own tweaks and modifications. Every new signing may prompt you to load it up and tweak a value. In addition, some of last season's scorelines may have happened as a result of circumstance or luck. Some teams, in particular, endured many injuries in the same position and suffered as result. (E.g. United's centre-back issues resulted in them winning just three trophies)

Now on an informal note, I hope you enjoy this article and get good use out of the ticker. It's always nice to receive pure, unbiased statistics that we can use as a base – so that we can then manipulate and distort them based on our own personal bias', and no one elses.

If you didn't find the ticker useful, or are not yet a member (crazy fools), you can at least use this article as a reference sheet for last season's clean sheet statistics.

Clean sheet analysis from two years ago for comparison

Thanks Parm for giving me the link and inspiration for this article