This season, there have been four managerial changes in the Premier League: two have been made by Nottingham Forest, one by West Ham United and one by Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Wolves are yet to play a match under the leadership of Rob Edwards, but how have Nuno Espírito Santo and Sean Dyche fared at their new clubs thus far?
In this article, we look at Nuno and Dyche’s impact since they first arrived at West Ham and Forest respectively.
- READ MORE: FPL set-piece and penalty takers for all 20 clubs: Updated
- READ MORE: Jump on, jump off: Best FPL fixture runs for all 20 teams
NUNO AT WEST HAM
| Games | Points | Goals | Goals conceded | Clean sheets | Mins per xG (rank v other PL teams) | Mins per xGC (rank v other PL teams) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Before Nuno | 5 | 3 | 5 | 13 | 1 | 97.8 (13th) | 62.1 (18th) |
| After Nuno | 6 | 7 | 8 | 10 | 0 | 78.3 (13th) | 65.3 (14th) |
After a shaky start, West Ham have won each of their last two matches, triumphing over Newcastle United and Burnley.
Prior to this, Nuno’s time as manager was characterised by odd team selections, with full-backs often positioned on the ‘wrong’ side and Lucas Paqueta (£5.9m) used up front.
The tactical tinkering has recently stopped, however, which has coincided with an upturn in the Hammers’ form.
In his last two outings, Nuno has named the same starting XI in a 4-3-3 formation, with Freddie Potts (£4.4m), Mateus Fernandes (£5.5m) and Paqueta impressing in central midfield.
Above image taken from the BBC
The corner-taking Potts has quietly racked up the joint-most defensive contributions (DefCon) of any West Ham player in these two matches, with 24. He’s also chipped in with five chances created.
Meanwhile, a primary concern for West Ham this season has been their frailty defending set-pieces, with their nine goals conceded from such situations by far the worst in the division before Nuno’s arrival.
Goalkeeping had been an issue as well, with Alphonse Areola (£4.3m) and Mads Hermansen (£4.4m) both underperforming.
But we have seen progress in both areas under Nuno, with just one goal conceded from set-pieces, suggesting that his time spent on the training pitch is starting to yield results.
Above: West Ham’s six-match xG/xGC trendline since the start of last season
Should West Ham continue to progress under Nuno, their Gameweek 18 ticker-topping run may lead to increased interest.
WEST HAM UNDER NUNO:
- Most shots: Bowen (14), Summerville (12), Paqueta
- Most chances created: Paqueta (8), Bowen, Fernandes (7)
- Most defensive contributions: Paqueta (60), Kilman (56), Summerville (47)
DYCHE AT FOREST
| Games | Points | Goals | Goals conceded | Clean sheets | Mins per xG (rank v other PL teams) | Mins per xGC (rank v other PL teams) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Before Dyche | 8 | 5 | 5 | 15 | 0 | 84.8 (13th) | 53.3 (19th) |
| After Dyche | 3 | 4 | 5 | 5 | 0 | 59.2 (6th) | 120.6 (5th) |
Forest are already on their third manager this season following the dismissals of Nuno and Ange Postecoglou, with Dyche now striving to restore momentum at the City Ground.
And so far, it’s been pretty decent.
Dyche has made only minor changes to his starting XI up to this point, with nine players ever-present starters in the league, which has helped provide some much-needed stability.
Above: Nottingham Forest players sorted by minutes played under Sean Dyche
In his first three league matches in charge, Dyche achieved his first victory in the third match against Leeds United, following a draw with Manchester United.
They are yet to keep a clean sheet domestically, but they have secured shut-outs in Europe against Porto and Sturm Graz.
One player who has stepped up under Dyche is Morgan Gibbs-White (£7.3m), who is back playing in his favoured No 10 role. He has subsequently scored against Porto, Man Utd and Leeds, and really ought to have netted a fourth, having also missed a penalty in Europe.
“I feel like I can finally breathe. It’s been a difficult couple of months here with all the change that’s happened, the bad performances. [Getting an identity back] was the first thing the gaffer came in and said to us. He told us that last season we had a real identity and structure to how we want to play and he wants to bring that back. He wants to build on that. We’ve only had a few training sessions but you can feel that the morale in the stadium and in the group feels a lot higher. It feels a lot more positive and it needs to stay like that. That’s a credit to the manager that’s come in.” – Morgan Gibbs-White
Meanwhile, Elliot Anderson (£5.3m) was superb in the most recent win over Leeds United, scoring from the penalty spot with Gibbs-White, Chris Wood (£7.2m) and Igor Jesus (£5.8m) off the pitch. He is arguably the best all-round FPL midfielder in Forest’s ranks, thanks to his vast routes to points (see below).
There have been real positives to take from the underlying numbers, too.
Forest rank sixth for minutes-per-expected goal (xG) and fifth for minutes-per-expected goal conceded (xGC) since Nuno’s arrival, albeit off a very small sample size.
Above: Nottingham Forest’s six-match xG/xGC trendline since the start of last season
Starting to look a bit more like the team we’d become familiar with last season, it suggests there is much more to come from Dyche’s Forest. That could be from Gameweek 13, when their fixtures start to pick up.
FOREST UNDER DYCHE:
- Most shots: Jesus (8), Gibbs-White (7), Hudson-Odoi, Ndoye, Williams (4)
- Most chances created: Anderson, Hudson-Odoi (5), Dominguez, Gibbs-White (3)
- Most defensive contributions: Anderson (40), Murillo (29), Ndoye (28)
