I just recently discovered that the Golazo web application—with up-to-the-minute statistical game information courtesy of MLSsoccer.com—provides details for teams in the final third. Sadly enough they don’t keep the data available for long so I took advantage of a late evening to tally up the following numbers over the nine MLS matches this weekend. Below are the passing rates for each team in the final third of the pitch.
| Team | Pass Completions | Pass Attempts | Pass Percentages | Opponent |
| Union | 68 | 105 | 74.20% | Vancouver |
| RSL | 68 | 98 | 72.40% | NYRB |
| NYRB | 89 | 131 | 69.10% | RSL |
| San Jose | 60 | 97 | 67.50% | Portland |
| Houston | 92 | 141 | 67.30% | Chicago |
| Portland | 91 | 146 | 66.40% | San Jose |
| New England | 72 | 121 | 66.20% | DC |
| DC | 69 | 115 | 64.10% | New England |
| Sporting KC | 75 | 121 | 63.50% | Montreal |
| Colorado | 64 | 113 | 63.30% | LA Galaxy |
| LA Galaxy | 69 | 121 | 63.20% | Colorado |
| Toronto FC | 85 | 137 | 62.90% | Columbus |
| Columbus | 54 | 107 | 62.50% | Toronto FC |
| Seattle | 67 | 117 | 61.50% | Chivas |
| Chicago | 57 | 103 | 61.10% | Houston |
| Vancouver | 51 | 102 | 55.30% | Union |
| Chivas | 54 | 108 | 52.00% | Seattle |
| Montreal | 31 | 80 | 50.80% | Sporting KC |
There really isn’t much in the way of true context at this point. Some of this is information is still about style rather than performance, but comparing the results and then applying some added data will be interesting. I wonder what, if anything, can be determined by this type of data.
I’d love to hear inputs from all you smart people.
American Soccer Analysis 
Harrison, Saw this for the first time today in prep for the podcast – good stuff – for better context – take total passes throughout game, then take these pass totals, and then shots taken, shots on goal and goals scored… to see if a linear relationship exists – one thing I would add is that passing as a penetration into the attacking third might miss dribble penetrations… not sure if that is available.
Oddly enough, not sure why but the difference between passing attempts in attacking third and successful passes in the attacking third was only 1 off the overall total GSO’s I logged for Portland ‘and’ the GSO’s I logged for San Jose…
In other words my GSO’s for Portland in that game were 53 and unsuccessful passes that game was 54… as for San Jose I tracked 37 GSO’s and the difference was 35.
I’m not offering that there is a relationship yet but it is intriguing 🙂 one additional thing – i don’t know if this data separates out assists or shots taken different from a pass – in the OPTA chalkboard an assist is counted as a successful pass but a shot taken isn’t…
All the best,
Chris
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