Talk on Corners

Arsenal have generated 178 corner kicks in the WSL this season, the most in the division by a considerable distance. Manchester City have the second most with 138, then Chelsea with 131 and then Manchester United with 120. With two games left of the league season, the Gunners have only scored one first phase goal from a corner- Amanda Ilestedt’s effort against Chelsea in December.

Katie McCabe’s second goal against Bristol City in October was, strictly speaking from a second phase action from a setpiece. But given it was so close to the goal (ie, a Bristol player glanced the initial delivery and it landed at McCabe’s feet ten yards out), internally Arsenal will look at that as a setpiece goal too. Russo also scored a second phase setpiece goal during the defeat at West Ham in February.

However, even throwing those goals in, three out of 178 is a poor ratio- the worst in the league. After the team generated 10 corners at Everton on Sunday and didn’t force a shot on target from any, Arseblog News asked Eidevall about the low threat shown from setpieces across the season he was in no mood to sugar coat his answer.

‘Given we have the most corners in the league and we have a team like Everton who are doubly as effective on corners as we have been so far this season, yeah, absolutely, it is a major area of improvement for the team for next season to be more effective.’

In Katie McCabe, Steph Catley and Beth Mead, Arsenal do not struggle for top class deliverers of corners. Amanda Ilestedt scored four headed goals in last summer’s World Cup but, in the league (Arsenal did score two headed goals from setpieces in the Conti Cup group stage via Wubben-Moy and Ilestedt) she has only scored once. Russo is one of the biggest aerial threats in the WSL and she plays in most games. Arsenal certainly don’t want for delivery or players who can attack a good delivery.

130 of Arsenal’s 178 corners have been inswingers, 21 have been outswingers and 27 have been played short. In the women’s game, inswinging corners are more heavily utilised than in men’s football due to the fact that many goalkeepers in women’s football are not notably taller than their outfield counterparts.

Every team in the WSL plays more inswingers than outswingers with the exception of Aston Villa (who have a perfect 50% split between the two from their 66 corners this season). Leicester City are the most committed to this model, playing 66 inswinging corners and just one outswinger. While you could accuse Arsenal of a lack of variety, it isn’t notably different to the general WSL trends.

Unfortunately, FBRef’s shot data doesn’t separate corners and free-kicks but Arsenal have produced 55 shots from dead balls this season, which is second only to Chelsea in the league. They only have one goal from those 55 attempts. (Incidentally Chelsea have only two goals from their 59 shots from setpieces this season, so clearly they have room for improvement too). Some of Arsenal’s general profligacy is a factor here. Arsenal have the biggest XG underperformance in the league at -4.6. Only they and West Ham (-3.1) are underperforming XG in the WSL currently.

In a season where Arsenal have scored eight goals fewer than Manchester City (having played a game more than them) and seven fewer than Chelsea (having played two games more than them), even moderate success from setpieces could have pushed Eidevall’s team far closer to the title race this season. In the 1-0 defeat to Liverpool on the opening day, their 19 corners produced one shot on target. Ilestedt did miss a couple of presentable headers from corners in the 1-0 defeat to Spurs.

Eidevall doesn’t de-emphasise the importance of setpieces either. After his first competitive game in charge of the club against Okzhetpes in the Champions League preliminary rounds, he almost bemoaned the lack of variety in the goals after a 4-0 win. ‘We scored the hard goals today and we were using established play against 11 of their players where we needed lots of passes in a row to come off.

‘But we didn’t score from any corners, or wide free-kicks, or from crosses or counter-attacks. We need to be better in those situations as well.’ Arsenal made a coaching change in January 2023, with Leanne Hall, who had previously been in charge of setpiece coaching, moving on and being replaced by Swede Patrick Winqvist who now oversees that department (in both the defensive and attacking senses).

None of us are at London Colney every day, so to suggest Winqvist shares the sole blame for the setpiece underperformance would be unsubstantiated but I would suggest setpiece conversion must figure somewhere in his KPI’s. The men’s team have shown this season that effective corner routines can win you a lot of crucial points. However it comes about, Arsenal Women have to be far more effective from corners.