Erling Haaland tops big chances missed list ahead of Darwin Nunez
With his 99th-minute winner against Nottingham Forest, Darwin Nunez scored his tenth Premier League goal of the season and continued a run of three strikes in his last three outings.
While debate continues over whether the 24-year-old's finishing is erratic or just unlucky, what it undeniable now is his impact.
After coming through goal drought that spanned 12 appearances earlier this season, Nunez is now at the most clinical he has ever been for Liverpool.
The Uruguayan has 11 goal involvements in as many games in 2024 and has proven himself a match-winner for the Reds on multiple occasions.
In fact, according to Opta's Michael Reid no Premier League player has scored more match-winning goals than Nunez this season.
As the former Benfica star's form becomes harder to play down even for his most ardent critics, what becomes clear is that missing chances does not make a striker 'bad'.
xG and chances missed stats have regularly been used by rival fans to characterise Darwin as a misfiring or poor finisher who would never find the net on a consistent basis.
However, while Nunez does underperform his xG and miss his fair share of chances, that misses the point. The reality is that the very best strikers are the ones that put themselves in the position to miss those chances in the first place.
As a case in point, Erling Haaland — last season's Premier League Golden Boot winner and leading scorer again in 2023/24 — is currently underperforming his xG by 3.89 goals (a not a dissimilar amount to Nunez who is underperforming by 4.26).
Perhaps even more interestingly, the Premier League ranks Haaland as leading the way for 'big chances missed' this season with 26, a full five ahead of second-placed Nunez.
On average, Haaland and Nunez are both missing at least one big chance per game, but that shouldn't be news, or a stick to beat them with. The best strikers in the world still miss a lot of chances.
Haaland famously spruned a glorious opportunity for Manchester City at the end of the first-half of Sunday’s 3-1 win over Manchester United, shanking wide from close range.
“I’ve missed a lot of chances, I’ll keep missing chances, and I’ll keep scoring goals. I’ll probably miss a big chance in future, people will criticise me. Should I keep thinking about it? No," the Norwegian said after the game.
It's a sensible mentality to have.
Fitness permitting, the two strikers will go head to head at Anfield this Sunday as the leading No. 9's for their sides.
While Nunez may never replicate Haaland's phenomenal goalscoring numbers (almost no-one will), he has proven himself a top quality forward who gives defences massive headaches and will continue to keep earning chances for Liverpool, despite the criticism he regularly faces from some quarters.
Analysing Nunez's winner against Forest, Thierry Henry — perhaps the Premier League's greatest ever forward — highlighted the Uruguayan for his positional intelligence before Alexis Mac Allister's cross.
"First and foremost, the one thing he does ever so well is that he goes back into an onside position straight away,” Henry said.
“He puts his body into a position of: 'I am going to have an opportunity to score'. Because why? Mac Allister has told you he is going to cross the ball because he looked, it’s not telepathic, he looked while he was turning."
While affectionately characterised by even his own fans as an instinctual 'chaos machine' of a striker, Nunez's recent form shows he can also be consistent too.
But even as he keeps scoring, you can be sure he's going to keep missing too. And that's just fine.
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