Coventry City dominate but fall 0-1 to Hull City in the Premier League

Coventry City dominated, created chances, kept pushing, and came away empty handed once again. The Coventry Building Society Arena watched the home side fall 0-1 to Hull City, in a Premier League match where the team that controlled the ball ended up as the victim of a late counterattack.

The story of the match was almost the complete opposite of what the scoreboard showed. Coventry City set up camp in the opposition's half from the very first minute, with Taiwo Awoniyi as the main threat: he tested the visiting goalkeeper at the 3rd, 21st, 34th and 37th minutes, the last of which forced a low save. Loum Tchaouna, Jack Rudoni, Caleb Yirenkyi with a header, and Aurele Amenda also had their chances, but the first half ended scoreless despite the home side's constant pressure.

The second half followed the same pattern: Coventry City pressed forward while Hull City defended and waited for its moment. Tatsuhiro Sakamoto and Matt Grimes had chances around the 70th minute, and deep into stoppage time Jay Dasilva headed a shot that forced another save. But amid all that pressure, Hull City found a way to strike with the little it had: in the 73rd minute, Liam Millar had already given a warning with a shot that went just wide after a counterattack. That warning came true in the 81st minute: Millar finished with his right foot from outside the box, after an assist from Mohamed Belloumi on another quick break, for the final 0-1.

Numbers that don't lie (not entirely)

The stats confirm the sense of a sterile dominance for Coventry City. The home side had 68.7% possession to Hull City's 31.3%, and comfortably outdid the visitors in shots, corners and passing volume. And yet the goal came from the side that touched the ball the least.

The post match expected goals figure, which measures chances created based on shot location, also backs up the home side's dominance: 1.219 for Coventry City against 0.637 for Hull City. It's a gap that confirms the home team created more and better chances, but soccer doesn't hand out points for creating, it hands them out for finishing.

The preview pointed to exactly the opposite of what ended up happening: our model gave Coventry City a 56% chance of winning, against just 19% for Hull City, with a draw at 25%. More goals were expected too: the preview projected 1.92 expected goals for the home side and 1.04 for the visitors, a combined 2.96. The final result, a tight 0-1, fell well short of that forecast and, more importantly, flipped the favorite that the numbers had pointed to before kickoff.

The loss leaves Coventry City without points after two matches played, with a negative goal difference. On the other side, Hull City has six points from two wins, cashing in on an efficient counterattack to take all three points from a ground where it barely set foot in the opposition's box. The gap between the two sides in the table already stands at six points, a reflection of how the start of the season is treating efficiency and possession very differently.