It was a tale of two halves for Burton Albion in the 2024/2025 EFL League One season.
By the middle of December, after 19 games played in the league, Burton had just two wins and 12 points in League One, sitting in 23rd place, nine points away from safety.
The poor form resulted in a change in managers, with Gary Bowyer and assistant manager Pat Lyons coming in to steady the ship.
Together, they helped finally drag the Brewers out of the relegation spots in the final four weeks of the season.
Since Bowyers arrival, Burton have been the 11th-best club in the league, which shows just how valuable a good manager can be.
Gary Bowyers arrival brought success to the club, mainly through his ability to get the best out of new signing Rumarn Burrell, who scored 11 league goals, all of them coming after Bowyer joined.
One of his biggest strengths has been his ability to affect zonal defenders during set-pieces, alongside his speed and quality in transition, which contributed to a majority of his goals.
Burton Albion have only scored 10 goals from set pieces, which puts them at the lower end of the set-piece league.
However, this doesnt mean their set pieces are poor.
In fact, since the managerial change, they have been the strongest set-piece team in terms of xG per corner.
They are the only team in the league with over 0.04 xG per corner, which shows that they consistently generate good chances from corner kicks.
However, they have found some issues finishing their chances, meaning their output doesnt match their good performances in corner kicks.
EFL League One xG Per Corner Stats
Below, we can see Burton Albions set-piece xG from game to game this season.
The change in manager originally did not give much of a set-piece boost, but after some time to implement his ideas, Gary Bowyers side has had a clear upturn in set-piece xG, with the last 11 matches giving the best 11 set-piece performances since the first games of the season.
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