Antoine Semenyo will slow down, but Bournemouth won't

Bournemouth are flying high, sitting 4th in the Premier League, and their left winger has been the best player in the division not named Erling Haaland. It’s been an incredible start to the campaign for Antoine Semenyo, who’s getting a lot of well-deserved hype. I dove into his stats hoping to see some confirmation of what I thought I was seeing in the games, but was surprised to find quite the opposite.

Minor meta commentary before we get going: Astute observers who read the website instead of getting emails of all the stories (subscribe, btw!) will notice that this is the second day in a row that Semenyo has been the header photo here at The Transfer Flow. When I read Neel’s piece about the international break and thought Ghana was the most interesting team involved, I had not yet decided to write this piece. Planning L. Anyway, actual football commentary.

Last season, Semenyo had a bit of a mini-breakout. His goal tally increased to 11, up from 8 the season before, and he recorded 4 assists too. Unfortunately, a lot of his production came in the first half of the season, and he faded a bit in the second half.

Fans and FPL players alike will be hoping this is the year he puts it all together after he racked up 6 goals and 3 assists in Bournemouth’s first 7 games. I am very sadly and — to me at least, surprisingly — here to tell you that he’s not looking like he’s going to continue being the Premier League’s top producing wide forward unless something changes.

I started researching this piece expecting to see signs of a breakout star, because to my eyes, Semenyo was playing better. It turns out he’s probably just had better shot selection. Relative to last season, he’s taking way fewer shots, getting fewer touches in the box, and creating marginally less value for his team with his dribbling.

The assists have probably been lucky as well. He’s got one excellent pass into the box for a high xG shot, but the others have been for very average quality chances. Semenyo’s 3 assists have come from just 0.53 xGA.

I expected Semenyo to be overperforming his xG a touch just given the narrow-angle goalkeeping disaster that was his goal against Fulham at the weekend. But before diving in, I did not realize just how few total shots he’d been taking. 5 non-penalty goals from 16 shots and 2.22 xG is running crazy hot.

8 total shots on target is a tiny sample, but Semenyo’s goals come from 3.05 total post-shot xG. He’s placing his SOT well — 4 of his 5 goals had over 0.5 post-shot xG — but he’s yet to run into a goalkeeper on top form and/or some bad luck.

None of this is critical of Semenyo as a player. Those of you screaming “just watch the games, nerd” have already forgotten: I already said up top that my watching of the games led me to believe that these numbers were going to be a lot better than they are. But my brain got tricked by the highlights and missed the low shot volume, key pass volume, and dribbling value. The margins between Very Good Bournemouth Player and Breakout Star Heading For Champions League are surprisingly thin, and he is, despite my excitement, looking closer to the former.

BUT! This does not mean I think that Bournemouth are also running hot in 4th place and likely to regress to the mean soon. We are, however, getting to the “hypothesis not well supported by data” portion of the newsletter.

Bournemouth’s attack has been surprisingly butt this season, with just 0.98 xG per 90 so far. They’re trailing well behind last season, when they had an above-average attack.

But I’m optimistic that some players who have not yet produced much for them this season are going to pick it up. Striker Evanilson had 0.4 xG per 90 and 10 non-penalty goals for the Cherries last season, and is currently sitting at 0.18 and 1 for this year. Youngsters Eli Junior Kroupi and Ben Gannon-Doak put up bonkers numbers last year in Ligue 2 and the Championship, respectively, and are being brought along slowly. Their output in very limited sub appearances has looked like the Ligue 2 and Championship versions of those players, and I think they’ll be important contributors in the second half.

I’m also optimistic that the extremely good Bournemouth defense has some room to get better. Despite replacing 3 of the 4 members of their back line and their goalkeeper in the summer, the Cherries have one of the best defenses in the Premier League so far this season. Their 0.81 xG conceded per 90 is 3rd in the Premier League, behind just Arsenal and Newcastle.

They’ve been mildly unlucky, conceding 8 goals from just 5.73 xG.

And the problem has not been substandard goalkeeping from new arrival Djordje Petrovic. He hasn’t been spectacular, but he is a plus shot-stopper so far. Bournemouth’s opponents have just been placing their shots expertly, in a way that probably isn’t going to continue. Bournemouth have conceded a full 4 more post-shot xG than regular xG so far this year.

If I had to pick out a reason Bournemouth won’t improve as the season goes on and go on to cement their spot in European places, it would be the same as most other teams: Injuries. But while you can say that about anyone, I think that Bournemouth are more susceptible to an injury crisis than just about anyone else. They bought less than they sold over the summer, and they play a fairly intense pressing style. A couple members of the back line going down could blow the whole thing up. They’re not that many injuries away from needing to start 18-year-olds.

But if you run the sim 1000 times, I think this team finishes in a European place more often than not. They’ve got the juice, even if I’m fading Semenyo in FPL.

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