League One August Review: Birmingham Impress, While Stockport and Wrexham Back Claims for Successive Promotions

The opening month of the 2024-25 League One season is now complete and we’re four games in, but what has the data told us so far?

The opening four matchdays of the 2024-25 League One season have provided sufficient ammunition for us to take a very early look at the underlying stats behind all 24 teams.

No side has managed a 100% record across their first four matches, with Stockport County and Wrexham – who only came up from League Two last season – sharing the lead with arguably the division’s biggest club, Birmingham City. It’s not been so enjoyable for Leyton Orient, who sit bottom of the league without a single point won.

It is Stockport who lead League One for both goal difference (+7) and expected goal difference (+5.0) as they find themselves in top place in the table.

It’s been a fantastic few seasons for Stockport, with two promotions in three seasons under Dave Challinor, but it could get even better in 2024-25 as they battle to win a place in the second tier for the first time since 2002.

Wrexham also won promotion from the fourth tier last season. Powered by Hollywood money, the Welsh side are looking to win back-to-back promotions from the fourth to the second tier, which would make them the first side to do so since Luton Town in 2018. While they sit behind Stockport on goal difference in the table (+6), they have perhaps been lucky to win 10 points from a possible 12 with their own expected goals figure of 4.0 below their opponents’ 5.0.

Our expected points model simulates the number of goals scored by each side in every match based on the xG value of the shots taken. It then uses the simulated number of goals to determine the match outcome (win/draw/loss). Each match is simulated 10,000 times; the expected points for each team in every game can then be calculated based on the proportion of simulations they win/draw/lose.

This is of course not an exact science, as expected goals data doesn’t take a lot of factors into account, such as game state and dangerous periods of possession that don’t lead to shots. Nevertheless, it’s still a decent barometer of how teams are performing inside these opening four matches.

Wrexham are currently 15th in our League One expected points table with 5.1 points – that’s some way behind the leaders Stockport (9.2 points) and Birmingham (8.0).

Birmingham top the League One rankings for successful passes (2,144 – 313 more than any other side and over three times as many as Wrexham), while they also have the highest average possession figure (68.4%).

Across the last five full seasons of League One (since 2019-20), no side have reached an average possession figure of 65%, with MK Dons in 2020-21 managing 64.0%. Birmingham are also on course to become the first third-tier side over this time to average more than 500 successful passes per game. Only 42 games to go, though.

Birmingham lead the way in League One for build-up attacks (open-play sequences comprising 10+ passes and ending in a shot or has at least one touch in the box), with their 10 putting them just ahead of Peterborough (8), who actually lead the division for direct attacks (14). Direct attacks are those that see open-play sequences start just inside the team’s own half, have at least 50% of movement towards the opposition’s goal and ends in a shot or a touch in the opposition’s box. It comes as no surprise to see the Posh lead the league for fast-break attempts (9), too.

Chris Davies was the man entrusted with getting Birmingham back into the Championship, appointed this summer into his first managerial role after being Ange Postecoglou’s senior assistant coach at Tottenham last season.

So far, he’s done a great job of imprinting a clear style on Birmingham that has seen them dominate possession and work hard to win it back from their opponents when they lose it.

Three of their eight League One goals this season have followed a high turnover of possession after winning the ball back from their opponents 40 metres from goal; that is already one more than in the whole of last season (2). Their willingness to regain possession is also shown by their PPDA (passes per defensive action) average this season; no team in League One has allowed their opponents fewer passes before making a defensive action than Birmingham (8.3).

Another of the relegated sides in the 2023-24 Championship have implemented a strong pressing game, too. Huddersfield have attempted more shots following high turnovers (7) than any other side in the opening four matchdays of the new season, while only three clubs have provoked more high turnovers overall than they have (33), and their PPDA of 9.8 is behind only Birmingham.

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