Ross County’s impressive strike rate will give Malky Mackay plenty cause for optimism ahead of the final stretch of the season.
The Staggies have spent the much of the campaign at the foot of the Premiership, but a fine flurry of form prior to the winter break lifted them to 10th place.
Although County will now be looking further up the table, the Dingwall men still clearly have work to do to fend off the advances of Dundee and St Johnstone in the relegation zone.
Results have not always gone County’s way, but one of the most consistently pleasing factors this term has been the Staggies’ goals scored column. That has been most noticeable in their matches leading up to the winter break, with County failing to score in just one of their last 12 games.
Despite their lowly position, the Highlanders boast the fourth highest goals tally in the division, with 27 strikes to their name. That’s an average of 1.35 goals per game from the 20 matches played thus far.
This betters an expected goals tally of 1.18 per game, with the table above also showing County are outperforming their xG by a greater margin than any other team.
The Staggies have also shown an impressive rate of accuracy in their finishing.
County have averaged 10.8 shots per game so far, with their conversion rate of 12.5% coming only marginally second behind Motherwell.
That statistic will be a huge source of satisfaction for Mackay, underlining the goalscoring threat his side possesses.
Goalscoring burden shared among County’s squad
The scorers chart shows the goals have been well spread throughout County squad, with Regan Charles-Cook the top marksman on six for the campaign.
That has been an important feature of County’s goalscoring exploits given their two most regular forwards – Jordan White and Dominic Samuel – have only netted four between them. Alex Samuel, the Staggies’ other attacker, has yet to get off the mark, but has had considerably less game time.
Both White (3.68) and Dominic Samuel (2.33) are underperforming against their expected goals, along with midfielders Ross Callachan (4.67 – the highest xG of any County player) and Harry Paton (1.38).
It is the Staggies’ leading two scorers who show up most favourably in this regard, with both Charles-Cook (2.82) and Blair Spittal (2.56) considerably outperforming their expected goals.
County have also had a strong return of goals from their defenders, with Jack Baldwin, Alex Iacovitti and the now-departed Harry Clarke netting six between them.
Paton and Joseph Hungbo have led the way for County in the assists chart, with both players having contributed three so far. White (0.52) and Clarke (0.71) have also outperformed their expected assists, having both contributed two.
Although he is the second top scorer on four goals, Spittal’s solitary assist puts him below his xA of 2.7.
It is clear from the above graphic that the goalscoring burden has been well shared among County’s squad, however.
Given their consistency in finding the net, Mackay will be hoping for much of the same in the final 18 matches of the campaign.
