With this season’s Premier League entering its final stages, we look back over 2024-25 to date and see who’ve been the most threatening teams at set-pieces.
An area of the game arguably once neglected, set-piece productivity is now in vogue, and effectiveness in such scenarios is broadly seen to reflect progressive and holistic coaching principles.
Many teams now leave no stone unturned in their quest for success, and the better utilisation of set-pieces has come into that.
But in the 2024-25 Premier League season, which clubs have been most successful in making set-pieces a reliable part of their arsenal?
Let’s find out…
Which Teams Are Most Dangerous from Set-Pieces?
Many of you are likely expecting Arsenal to feature quite heavily in this, aren’t you? They will, but perhaps not as much as you think.
Of course, there are a few different ways of determining how important set-pieces have been to a team. Goals are a pretty good place to start, though, and in that respect Arsenal actually find themselves behind a couple of teams this season.
Including own goals, Crystal Palace lead the way for goals from set-pieces in 2024-25 with 15, one more than Aston Villa (14) – Arsenal are then tied in third with Everton on 13.
Palace’s most recent set-piece goal came via the head of Chris Richards from an Adam Wharton corner against Manchester City at the weekend, and although that game ultimately ended in a 5-2 defeat, head coach Oliver Glasner was keen to take a moment to focus on their work on Tuesday.
“I’m proud of my coaching staff and the players because they are analysing [set-pieces], they are training it and the players are executing – they’re doing such a great job,” he said. “Whenever a goal is scored from a set-piece, then you have to think about it and you have to train it, and this is what we started since we arrived. Really, my assistants and the players, they also can see and feel that it helps us to score goals, it helps us to win games and it’s a really great job what they’re all doing.”
Quite. When own goals are taken into consideration, 36.6% of Palace’s Premier League goals this term have come from set-pieces, making them one of just two teams to have seen at least a third of their output come via dead-ball situations. They’re not top of that list, though.
A whopping 38.2% of Everton’s goals this term have come from set-pieces, meaning they’ve been the most reliant on these scenarios for their goals.
That’s made all the more impressive considering they didn’t have a specific ‘specialist’ set-piece coach while Sean Dyche was manager, and yet they were very effective at dead balls under him prior to his dismissal in January.
Another decent illustrator of dead-ball prowess is expected goals (xG) from set-pieces, which Palace also rank well for. Their 13.7 xG from set-plays puts them third and also equates to the third-greatest proportion of overall xG among all Premier League clubs this term (28.6%).
But it’s Nottingham Forest who’ve relied on set-plays for the greatest chunk of their xG at 29.4% – as such, it’s fair to suggest they wouldn’t be pushing quite as hard for Champions League qualification were it not for their effectiveness at set-pieces, with their 12 goals a figure bettered by only four teams.
Set-pieces aren’t all equal, though, are they?
Which Teams Are the Most Dangerous from Corners?
Of all 187 set-piece goals scored across the Premier League this season, 58.8% of them have come via corners. And considering the controlled parameters of corners, in that you always know where they’re taken from, they’re understandably the most likely to be trained and/or analysed.
And it’ll come as little surprise to learn that Arsenal lead the way in many measures of corner productivity, most notably with goals. Eleven of their corners have yielded a goal when own goals are included, putting them top of the pile with one more than Palace.
The Gunners lead the way for corners followed by at least one shot (77), total shots following corners (94), xG following corners (11.7) and the number of first contacts that are a shot (44).
Coach Nicolas Jover has been credited with having a transformational effect on Arsenal’s set-piece effectiveness, with the team mixing up where they make their runs from; but credit must also be given to the players. Gabriel Magalhães has become a deadly option in the box, while Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka have routinely played inviting deliveries into dangerous positions.
But Arsenal’s numbers at corners are, of course, also partly a product of the fact they get more than most teams. We can also analyse teams’ output at a proportional level in an attempt to even the playing field somewhat.
For instance, Arsenal actually drop down to fifth for the proportion of corners that yield a shot as the first involvement (20.5%) after the taker puts the ball into play. West Ham (20.7%), Manchester United (21.1%), Ipswich Town (21.7%) and Fulham (24.9%) are all above the Gunners, meaning they’re actually more reliable at getting shots away, relative to their total number of corners.
Fulham are a particularly curious case because they also rank second for the proportion of corners that are successful – those that find a teammate. While Man City (54.3%) and Tottenham Hotspur (47.8%) either side of them see their figures inflated by taking proportionately more short corners than anyone else (34.8% and 30.8%, respectively), Fulham’s proportion of short corners (13.9%) is actually below average.
The likely explanation for Fulham having a good record of meeting corner deliveries and getting shots away but actually quite a poor one when it comes to scoring goals (3, excluding own goals) and creating high-value chances (4.4 xG, the sixth fewest) potentially lies in their reliance on outswinging corners.
Their 78 outswinging corner deliveries is both the most in total and greatest proportion of all corners (52.4%). As a result, their 30 shots as the first involvement from an outswinging corner is nearly double that of any other team (16 – Nottingham Forest). But this has only yielded one goal.
This also brings into focus a nice contrast between Fulham and Arsenal. The Cottagers don’t really pack the six-yard box, with their average of 1.6 players in that zone at corners being the fewest of all Premier League teams this term. Arsenal, however, squeeze 3.9 players into the six-yard box on average, comfortably the most.
Unsurprisingly, then, the Gunners have aimed 77.2% of their corners into the six-yard box; that’s exactly 20 percentage points more than anyone else (52.2% – Wolves). Not only does that say a lot about their strategy at corners, but it reflects well on their takers because it shows how consistent they are at getting deliveries into the zone closest to goal and where they know they have plenty of teammates.
Which Teams Are the Most Dangerous from Indirect Free-Kicks?
As alluded to before, free-kicks are of course slightly more difficult to plan for/around – don’t just take our word for it; several experts have told Opta Analyst just that.
Whereas you always know where corners will be taken, there’s almost infinite possibilities when it comes to indirect free-kicks.
Nevertheless, they can still be useful scenarios that lead to danger or produce goals; just ask Everton.
The Toffees have actually scored more goals from free-kick situations (7, including an own goal) than they have corners (5, including 2 own goals) this term, and there’s several interesting things to glean from their effectiveness in these scenarios.
For starters, it should be pointed out that only two of the seven indirect free-kicks goals have seen the free-kick delivery itself be an assist. Now, that’s partly because one was an own goal by Craig Dawson, however it also highlights how good Everton are at keeping the attack alive even if they don’t necessarily get a shot off straight away.
They scored goals against Crystal Palace (both games), Wolves and Bournemouth that were technically from free-kick situations but were either cleared to the edge of the box at some point or didn’t even make it to the penalty area with the initial delivery. And yet they still worked the scenarios to their advantage.
James Tarkowski is an especially important player at dead-ball situations for Everton. He often isolates players at the far post and heads back towards the six-yard box, a routine that’s led to multiple goals this term. As such, he leads the Premier League for proportion of first contacts at corners (13.2%), ranks second in free-kick situations (24%) and has tallied the third most touches in the opposition’s box among nominal centre-backs (55).
Frequently targeting Tarkowski at the back post potentially goes some way to explaining why Everton have actually only created more chances directly from free-kick deliveries (8) than two teams this season.
Palace and Brighton are top of the pile with 17 each, though Bournemouth lead the way for goals set up directly from free-kick deliveries (excluding own goals).
As such, Palace, Brighton and Bournemouth all rank pretty well for total goals from indirect free-kick situations with four apiece, but they’re outside the top three.
Behind Everton are Aston Villa (6) and Newcastle (5), with the two Champions League hopefuls actually facing each other at Villa Park this weekend. Newcastle went clear of Palace, Brighton and Bournemouth in the indirect free-kick goal stakes (“you’ll never sing that!”) on Wednesday, with Fabian Schär glancing in from a wicked right-wing delivery in their 5-0 hammering of Glasner’s Eagles.
We may still be coming to terms with the awkward sight of set-piece coaches standing on the touchline when a corner is about to be delivered as if awaiting a moment in the spotlight, but there’s no doubt dead-ball excellence has provided another discussion topic and level of intrigue to the Premier League in recent times. And that can only be a good thing (for us, anyway).
Subscribe to our football newsletter to receive exclusive weekly content. You can also follow our social accounts over on X, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook.
