As an ideal, some football fans may hate it, but others absolutely adore xG - and now, xG has finally made its way to the Football Manager series.
A good percentage of FM fans have been clamouring for xG to hit the franchise for the past couple of releases, and now there's finally a Football Manager game that has this extra detail included in it. Like so many other features of FM21, this is something that you can make the most out of it you really want to, or something that other gamers may choose to largely ignore.
For those wondering what xG even is, the breakdown of xG from Opta reads:
Expected goals (xG) measures the quality of a shot based on several variables such as assist type, shot angle and distance from goal, whether it was a headed shot and whether it was defined as a big chance.
Basically, the higher your xG numbers, the more goals you should expect your team to be scoring. And if they're not scoring the goals to match the xG figures, that's when a manager needs to be asking serious questions of their attacking players, of their system, and of their management style.
Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics.
As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer and Presenter, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic.
Between his main day job, his role as lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund and Eli Roth to Kevin Smith and the Russo Brothers, to Kevin Conroy and Frank Miller, to Bret Hart and Sting, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, and Brian Flynn, to many, many more. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is a long-standing season ticket holder and an FSA Award-winner for his time co-hosting the Fearless in Devotion podcast.
