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The Guardian - UK

Lifestyle

Coco Khan

Are footballers scoring more? We ask an expert

Illustration of football going through chest of goalkeeper — ‘This season we’re at 2.77 goals a game in the Premier League.’ Illustration: Lalalimola/The Guardian

Across English football, we’ve seen a spate of high scorelines, whether it was last year’s 9-0 victory for Manchester United over Southampton (one of the biggest win margins in Premier League history), United’s 11-10 defeat by Villarreal in the Europa League final, the nail-biting 21-goal penalty shootout between Liverpool and Chelsea in the League Cup final last month, or October’s record-setting non-league match, which saw 44 penalties. I asked Duncan Alexander, sports data expert and chief editor at The Analyst, why.

Hi Duncan! So why are there more goals in football now?
Do you mean penalties? Or goals generally?

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