In the 2023 World Cup, Elite Goalkeeping Does Not Necessarily Mean Wins

In the first three days of the 2023 Women’s World Cup, there were penalty kicks in eight of the first nine matches, an oddly high number. Four of those PKs went in, and the other four were saved — a 50% save rate, surprising given that PKs are generally successful 70 to 80% of the time.

But the especially shocking part is that most of these saves came from young goalies on underdog teams, blocking shots from experienced players on longtime powerhouses.

Nigeria’s Chiamaka Nnadozie saved a PK from Canadian captain Christine Sinclair. Costa Rican keeper Daniela Solera saved one from veteran Jennifer Hermoso, Spain’s top all-time scorer. Vietnam’s Trần Thị Kim Thanh saved a shot from U.S. co-captain Alex Morgan.

The constant penalty kicks eventually died down. But the high-level goalkeeping early on set the tone for the rest of the World Cup to date: This tournament has seen a lot of great goalies, and a lot of great saves. But, oddly, not a lot of wins for those talented keepers.

As the women’s game grows internationally in strength and popularity, the World Cup has expanded from 24 teams to 32, and it has become extra competitive as a result: 16 teams advanced to the knockout stage, while 16 teams were sent home. Based on statistics, some of the best goalies in the World Cup were on those teams that went home – far more so than in the previous tournament.

For each team, we can compare its goals allowed per game to the number we would expect based on the volume and quality of shots its defense allowed – essentially estimating the number of goals saved by the keeper relative to the World Cup average. This stat usually tracks pretty well with team winning percentages, as evidenced by the 0.612 correlation between those two stats at the 2019 World Cup.

However, the data from 2023 shows that having a lot of saves — even a lot of really good saves (remember, we are controlling for the difficulty of the shot via the likelihood that it would go in) — has not necessarily translated to a higher chance of winning at this World Cup. The correlation between goals saved per game and winning percentage in 2023? Just 0.272, indicating a much weaker relationship.

What’s driving this? One theory is that World Cup expansion might be making it tougher for goalies to carry teams. As newer teams are added to the field, those squads might be more likely to be carried by their goalkeepers, and struggle on defense and offense. (It’s easier to build around one player in net than 10 out in the field.) So as a result, teams with excellent goalkeepers might be less likely to win at the World Cup.

Another factor might be that defense is generally stronger this year, making it harder for great goaltending to differentiate a team from the pack. In the tournament so far, the percentage of saves made is 68.8%, which doesn’t particularly stand out compared to previous years. But the average number of goals allowed by each team is lower compared to past World Cups, with an average of 1.31 goals allowed per game in 2023 compared to 1.40 in 2019, 1.43 in 2015, 1.73 in 2007 and 1.67 in 2003.

Part of the lower average is also because the percentage of clean sheets has been high — a little under 45%, much higher than 2019 (31.7%), 2015 (20.2%) and 2011 (23.4%).

In previous World Cups, top teams would run up the score against newer or lower-ranked teams, such as the United States’ infamous 13-0 win against Thailand, which were playing in just its second World Cup. This year, the narrative has been different. While there have been some blowouts, there have also been a lot of low-scoring games: 12 matches ended in 1-0 wins, while seven ended in 0-0 draws.

A lot of these close matches involved teams that eventually did not advance. Of the teams that were eliminated, 10 had save percentages above 70%; only two, China (30%) and Italy (38.5%), had save percentages below 50%.

A great example of this is Haiti. Goalkeeper Kerly Théus played great this tournament, recording 17 saves and a save percentage of 95.2%. And yet Haiti lost all three group stage games, ending with zero points and zero goals. All three of Haiti’s games were inevitably won by penalty kicks, two awarded because of handballs and one due to a foul in the box.

The only shot that Théus let in was a Denmark goal late in stoppage time that brought the score to 2-0.

In all of these games, Théus’s excellent performance could not single-handedly make up for Haiti’s defenders making mistakes in the box and its offense struggling to create chances. After all, 17 saves is impressive, until you remember that it means that the team allowed 17 shots on goal in the first place.

Costa Rica’s Solera, who saved one of those early penalty kicks, ended the group stage with 24 saves, a tournament high so far; Vietnam’s Kim Thanh recorded 16 saves. But both teams exited the tournament ranked last in their group and with high negative goal differential — -7 for Costa Rica and -12 for Vietnam, respectively. Other high-performing eliminated goalies include the Philippines’ Olivia McDaniels, who had 17 saves, and Portugal’s Inês Pereira, who had 10 saves and a 90.9% save percentage.

A team that could have easily fallen into this trap is Jamaica. Jamaican keeper Rebecca Spencer, who plays for Tottenham Hotspur, had 17 saves. She saved 100% of the shots against Jamaica, leading the team to three clean sheets: Two 0-0 draws against France and Brazil, and a 1-0 win over Panama.

Jamaica has a lot of positives, but Spencer has been a huge piece of why it advanced for the first time in World Cup history. Against Brazil, which sealed Jamaica’s knockout bid, Spencer had eight saves alone. She is elite, and, importantly, her team was able to get enough goals (one) and have enough defensive strength to stay steady and move on.

Still, it doesn’t change the fact that, so far, things have seemed especially hard for elite goalkeepers in this tournament. It used to be that you couldn’t expect to win without a good goalie; now, teams with top-tier goalies have been unable to come out with the win, only a less lopsided loss.