So, we’re halfway through the 2024-2025 English Premier League season with Matchweek 19 just being played. Given Manchester City’s recent dip in form, I thought it would be interesting to do a comparison of the current Manchester City form vs. where they were at this stage last season.
To note, throughout this article I reference last season a number of times. Keep in mind that when doing so, I am meaning at the midpoint of the season after 19 games played, not the whole season.
With half of the Premier League games already being played, I’ll start with a high level overview of their record and then dive a bit deeper into the following categories:
- Passing
- Shooting
- Defensive actions
- Miscellaneous statistics
The intent is to see where they key differences are between the two years of data in the hopes that we can pinpoint some areas where City must improve in order to turn their season around.
General Statistics
City’s record so far this season is 9-4-6 (9 wins, 4 draws, 6 losses), resulting in 31 points picked up, an average of 1.6 points per game. Last season, their record was 12-4-3 (12 wins, 4 draws, 3 losses). So, with the same number of matches drawn, they’ve traded 3 additional wins last season for 3 additional losses this season. After 19 games last season, City had accumulated 40 points, an average of 2.1 points per game.
City have scored 32 goals this season and have 26 goals against. While last season, they had scored 45 goals after 19 games and had only 21 goals against. City’s average goal differential (the average of goals for minus goals against for each game) at the mid-point last season was 1.26. Meaning on average, they were scoring 1.26 more goals than their opponent in a single match. This season, their average goal differential is 0.32, which is a goal differential of approximately 1 less per game.
All of the three losses they had last season (as of the mid-point of the season) were lost by one only goal and in only one game did City fail to score. In the 24-25 season, City have lost four games by only one goal (all 2-1 losses) while they have failed to score in two games (4-0 to Tottenham and 2-0 to Liverpool).
With all that being said, City have slightly more goals against this season than last season (26 vs. 21), which could indicate some defensive problems. However, what appears to be contributing more to the dip in form this season is the lack of goals for (32 vs. 45 last season). We’ll dig further into the data in the following sections to see if we can outline some contributing factors to lack of goals being scored for City so far this Premier League season.
Passing Statistics
In City’s first 19 games this 2024-2025 Premier League season, they have a passing accuracy of 88.4% based on 12,422 passes attempted and 10,985 passes completed. In comparison to the mid-point of last season, City had a similar passing accuracy at 88.6% but had made a lot more passes.
Last season after 19 games, City had attempted 13,327 passes, of which 11,802 were completed. So, while the accuracy of the passes has not decreased, on average, City are making about 43 less passes per game this season.
City’s total passing distance is 176,553 yards so far this season, compared with 195,804 after 19 games last season. Furthermore, of those total passing distances, 49,515 yards are progressive passing yards (passes towards the opponent’s goal) this season, compared to 54,816 yards after mid-way through last season.
What is interesting is that progressive passing distance as a percentage of total passing distance is 28% in both seasons. This outlines that the decreased number of passes so far this season is what is contributing to the lack of progressive passing yards, it isn’t that City’s style of play has necessarily changed (e.g., they are still passing forward the same percentage of the time).
Additionally, when looking at other notable passing statistics, the numbers may be surprising to some readers. For key passes (assisted shots or passes directly leading to a shot), passes into the penalty area, and crosses into the penalty area, City are over 9% better in all three categories this season than last season after 19-games played.
When looking at all these passing statistics combined, it doesn’t appear that City’s passing style has changed much season over season. It is evident that they are making less passes this season compared to the same time frame last season, but it doesn’t appear that those passes are any less accurate or less progressive (i.e., attacking mindset). Furthermore, in the 24-25 season, they have more key passes which lead to shots and they are also getting the ball into the box more which is evident in both the passes and crosses into the penalty area metrics.
So, if it isn’t passing, what is causing this dip in form. Next, we’ll take a look at some shooting metrics to see what has changed when compared to last season.
Shooting Statistics
In the first 19 games of this 24-25 Premier League season, City have taken 330 shots, of which 107 have been on target (32% accuracy). Interestingly enough, after the first 19 games of last season, City had taken 306 shots (24 less shots) but 119 of them were on target (12 more shots on target than this year), resulting in a shot accuracy of 39%.
As noted previously, in the first 19 games this season, City has scored 32 goals, compared to the 44 goals scored in the same timeframe last season. So despite the 24 more shots taken this season, City have less shots on target, resulting in 7% lower accuracy and less goals scored.
This season, for every 10.3 shots, City have scored a goal. For every 3.3 shots on target, City have scored a goal. Compared to the first half of the 2023-2024 season, City only required 7 shots to score a goal, or 2.7 shots on target to score a goal.
While it might not seem like much of a difference between the seasons on a per game level, these differences make a big impact over the course of a number of games. For instance, due to decrease in City’s shooting accuracy this season, they are required to take ~47% more shots than last season to score a goal.
When digging into the shots a bit deeper, one reason for the decreased accuracy season over season could be due to shots being taken at a further distance from goal. However, when looking at the numbers, the average shot distance for Manchester City this season is 16.9 yards. After the first 19 games last season, City’s average shot distance was 16.4 yards. So, it’s hard to think that 0.5 yards of distance would result in the 7% decrease in accuracy.
Defensive Statistics
As noted above, City have conceded 26 goals so far this season, against the 21 they had conceded last season in the first 19 games. City had made less tackles this season with 250, compared to the 262 at the midpoint last season. Despite this, City have actually won two more tackles in the 24-25 Premier League season (152 won vs. only 150 after 19 games last season).
When looking at the location of tackles on the pitch, they can be broken down into thirds: defensive, midfield and attacking. While the total percentage of tackles in the defensive third was quite similar for both seasons, the results differ for the midfield and attacking thirds.
As seen below, Manchester City are making less tackles (less in terms of a proportion of their total tackles) in the midfield third this season, compared to last. One thought might be due to the absence of Rodri, who not only made the most tackles for City last season, he also made the most tackles in the midfield third for City last season. His absence this season has been noticeable, and the numbers presented indicate this is one area where it is apparent.
Additionally, it looks as though this season, Manchester City are tackling higher up the pitch which might point to a higher press being utilized this season. As outlined in the table, 21.6% of all their tackles have been made in the attacking third, compared to 15.6% last season (after the first 19 games).
There are a few other areas to focus on in defensive actions that differ from last year, starting with blocks. Blocks can be measured in terms of blocking a shot or blocking a pass. After 19 games last season, City had completed 177 blocks. 40 of those were blocked shots, while 137 were blocked passes.
At the midpoint of this season, Manchester City have completed 164 blocks total which is 13 less than last season, equaling about 7.3% less. Those 164 shots are broken down into 44 shots blocked and 120 passes blocked. While they have increased the number of blocked shots this season, the number of passes blocked has decreased notably.
One might again, point to Rodri’s absence as a result of the decrease in the blocked passes. And true, he was the fourth highest for blocked passes for City for the entire season last year. However, Foden averaged ~1 blocked pass per game last season, is only averaging 0.4 blocked passes per game this season.
Another key contributor to blocked shots last season was Julian Alvarez, who also was averaging about 1 blocked pass per game. His move to Atletico Madrid in the summer has left a bit of a void in this category.
The final category to focus on in defensive actions is errors. An error is defined as an individual player’s mistake which leads directly to a shot by the opponent. At the midpoint of last season, City had 9 errors in total, at the end of last season, City had 17 errors in total. After 19 games so far this 24-25 season, City already have 18 errors.
Unsurprisingly, 5 of the 18 errors this season (28% of errors) were observed in the defeats to Liverpool and Tottenham, the two games this season where they have lost by more than one goal. Reducing the number of these individual errors is another key area that City are to improve on for the remainder of the season if they want to regain last season’s form.
Miscellaneous Statistics
Lastly, we review some miscellaneous statistics for Manchester City between this season and last season, after 19 games played. This 24-25 season, City have received five more yellow cards but one less red card that the midpoint of the 23-24 season.
Surprisingly though, they have committed less fouls this season, 143 vs. 171 last season. This indicates that the fouls being committed this season are being punished as a yellow card more often than the 23-24 season. Every 3.6 fouls this season has resulted in a yellow card, while every 4.9 fouls last season resulted in a yellow card.
Last season, Rodri led City with the most fouls. He’s good at breaking up the play, stopping the opponent from generating momentum to push forward on a counter attack. His presence is surely missed this season.
Additionally, Rodri also led City last season in ball recoveries. Ball recoveries are simply defined as a loose ball recovered. By the end of the season, Rodri had over 50% more ball recoveries than City’s second highest, who was Kyle Walker. At the midpoint in the 24-25 season, City have recovered 17% less loose balls than at the same time last season.
Similar to Rodri’s ability to break up the play with smart, tactical fouls, he is also an integral part to collecting loose balls from opponents, which allows City to regain possession and restart their attack. His presence in this area has surely been missed this season as well.
Summary
That’s it for this article. In this post, we do a deep dive into Manchester City’s performance this season vs. last season and see if we can make any observations about City’s recent dip in form.
Given that the English Premier League season is at the midpoint, with 19 games being played, we compared City data from this season to the first 19 games in Manchester City’s 2023-2024 season.
Key areas we focused on were some general win/loss statistics, passing, shooting, defensive actions and then some miscellaneous metrics. While many statistics are similar from season to season. Notable differences can be observed in City’s goal for metric, quantity of shots being taken and the accuracy of those shots, the area of the pitch they are making tackles, as well as the number of fouls committed and loose balls recovered.
All these factors appear to have contributed to City’s recent dip in form. The purpose of this article was to look at City as a whole, and not dive too deep into any one player. While we did mention some key players who are missing or not yet achieving the heights they did last season, the main focus was to look at the team’s statistics.
Stay tuned for future posts and send us a message if there is a specific topic that you would like to see covered.
As always, thanks for taking the time to read these posts!
JC