The unluckiest teams in the 2022/23 Premier League - including Newcastle and Man Utd

Every football fan is possessed by the same delusion – that their team is the unluckiest of the lot. The mind of the supporter is filled to the brim with the perfectly-catalogued memory of every missed chance, every dodgy refereeing decision and every moment of misfortune that has befallen their club, and with that comes the assumption that no other team could possibly have suffered so much bad luck as theirs.

Of course, for one team every season, it isn’t a delusion at all. One ill-starred team really was the least lucky of the lot, and it would be somewhat satisfying to find out which – and while a comprehensive computation of every possible form of bad luck is impossible (or at least impossible for me) we can at least take a curious look at one easy-to-measure metric.

One team managed to hit the woodwork more than any other – one club rattled the posts and clattered the crossbar with more of their shots than anyone else, and that seems like a pretty solid start at figuring out the direction that the cold finger of fate pointed in more than anywhere else. So, without further ado, here are the five least fortunate teams in the Premier League, the teams who were millimetres out most often – despite, clearly, having also spent the most time touching wood. Guess that doesn’t work, then.

5. Tottenham Hotspur - 17 times (from 518 shots)

The main man behind Spurs’ season-long assault of the uprights was Son Heung-Min – the South Korean forward smacked it into the frame of the goal five times over the course of the campaign, putting him joint top of the individual league of misfortune and leaving us to wonder whether he really was off the boil or whether he was just plain unlucky.

There’s obviously a certain correlation between how often teams hit the woodwork and how often they shoot, but it may confirm a few Spurs’ fans suspicions about where the luck lies in north London when they learn that Arsenal had nearly 15% more attempts on goal than their rivals, but hit the framework 11% less often. Those jammy Gunners, eh?

4, Manchester City – 19 times (600 shots)

Let’s be honest – when you’ve won a historic Treble and conquered all before you, there’s only so unfortunate you can claim to be, and when it comes to how often they chipped the paintwork, they’re basically no more or less fortunate than poor old Tottenham, at least in terms of the percentages.

Erling Haaland was the main source of an uptick in the Etihad’s annual white paint budget, joining Son in the five-times club and simultaneously disproving the old maxim of “better lucky than good”. The mighty Norse meatslab was pivotal to City’s stunning trophy haul but also the kind of bloke who shouldn’t bother playing the lottery, apparently. Admittedly, he mostly shouldn’t bother because his signing-on fee was worth more than a double rollover jackpot on its own, but also because he’s unlucky.

3. Manchester United – 20 times (593 shots)

Let’s be honest, hitting the post one time more than your local rivals when you took seven shots less is such a tiny margin of difference that it’s completely insignificant from a statistical perspective. But who cares? United were slightly unluckier than City this season, and therefore deserve our utmost sympathy and earn victory in the coveted “salt tears” trophy. Those noisy neighbours can’t sing that.

And yes, they have their own five-time post botherer – Bruno Fernandes, who no doubt took his misfortune with his typical good grace. Antony was also pretty culpable, racking up four tiny dents of the Old Trafford woodwork. Not that goalframes are actually made of wood these days, obviously – they’re all aluminium, but for some reason we haven’t modernised the language of the game to make it “metalwork”. Why? No idea.

2. Aston Villa – 21 times (431 shots)

Now on to the two teams whose post-pounding antics really do serve as statistical outliers – Villa are the only team in the top five crossbar-crashers who weren’t even in the top ten for overall shots. They were around 50% more liable to hit the frame of the goal than any of the first three teams in our list. Now that’s the kind of luck you can justifiably complain about down the pub.

Not only did Ollie Watkins manage five assaults on the paintwork all by himself, both Leon Bailey and Emi Buendía helped to reduce the average structural integrity of Premier League goals four times apiece. Aluminium is a pretty hard-wearing material but Villa are doing their level best to push it to its limits, and probably their fans’ patience at the same time.

1. Newcastle United – 26 times (571 shots)

Cracking it off the frame of the goal a whopping five times more than any other side in the Premier League, Newcastle can justifiably be called the least fortunate team in the division – which is a shame, really, because the main advantage of being unlucky is that you can make your most miserable fans feel vindicated. And there really aren’t many miserable people in the Toon Army these days.

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The volume of good vibes in the Toon Army are probably sufficient that they never even noticed Joelinton and Callum Wilson pinging the paintwork four times apiece, and probably wouldn’t have cared even if they did. Save the bad luck for a tougher season than this, lads…