Further to the post below, Euro 2004 provides a great deal of similar nonsense with respect to football. Scoring goals, in this case, has a large element of chance. Using our urn analogy helps us understand what's really going on.

Let's label our balls "goal" or "not goal" for each player subject to the rules dscribed below. Most obviously, you'll get more goals by anyone the more draws you make from the urn, i.e. the more times you get a shot on goal. Better teams, however, create not only more shots on goal but shots from places with a higher probability of scoring. We can again envisage a series of urns in which the ratio of the number of balls labeled "goal" to "non-goal" changes, from a low scoring probability (more "non-goal" balls) to high (more "goal" balls). The highest probability urn is an attempt from ten yards or less from directly between the goalposts. Most pro footballers will score at a high % from this position, whatever their position. Creating draws from this urn is very difficult, though and can be made more difficult by skilful defence. The best way to create such opportunities is to beat either full back and pull the ball back from the dead-ball line. This is why good fullbacks are important and why players who can beat fullbacks so valued.

The next most dangerous play for a defence is an attack that breaks through the center of the penalty box. Incidentally, the reason this is not quite as dangerous as a cross from the byline is that the goalie has the play in front of him whereas the cross requires the goalie to switch from watching the cross (to be able to judge the flight) to trying anticipate the actual attempt on goal. It requires tremendous skill to dribble though the center of any defence even with good luck. For those who haven't played organized soccer this is hard to explain but it's basically geometry. Unless a defender is absent or falls down and the goalie is really bad, the forward just runs out of room. Neither of these conditions ever apply at any level of pro soccer. So that leaves sheer skill with a bit of luck. Only the great players ever do this and even they may only do it a few times in a career (they may get foiled by the keeper a number of times). Think Maradonna's 1986 goal against England. To work the ball into the box in the center is only marginally easier, since the offside trap also comes into play. The Swiss goal against France was such a goal. Pundits to the contrary ("the French back line looked vulnerable") the chance of anyone victimizing France again in this way in this tournament are close to zero. As the strike moves away from the box the chances of scoring diminish rapidly. They make great highlight reels but my guess is that maybe 1 in 30 go in.

All of this is by way of pointing out that commentators's obsession with "lax marking" is just laziness. It's an obvious comment to make and it's almost always wrong. One egregious example from yesterday was the commentator who ascribed Zidane's goal to a "breakdown in marking". I don't know how much closer the Swiss player who went up with Zidane could get to him without wearing the same shirt! Plus Zidane headed the ball virtually out of the grasp of the Swiss keeper. Believe it or not, sometimes the forward gets to the ball first! Give Zizou some credit for timing, technique and courage. And it was his turn from the urn.

Good teams don't win by "clinical finishing". They win by creating many high-probability goalscoring events, the probability of which also increases with their ability to create varied opportunities. Alternatively, they stymie their opponents into a barrage of hopeful crosses from forward of the box, long-range shots, free-kicks and corners. Sure goals do get scored from these situations but teams that rely on pulling these balls from the urn don't win championships. (Alas for Albion.)Great goalscorers convert many more of these opportunities than their peers but even they miss more than they convert. Get a tape of Czech-Holland and see how many van Nistelrooy might have scored - and he's as good as they come. The key is not the glamorous "moment of genius" but the accumulation of high-quality chances created by superior players, who may, indeeed, in isolation have a moment in which the luck ran with them that makes you forget the three previous times it didn't. Think Henry, yesterday.