Game of one half

Is RVP on a drought? What would the table look like if games ended at half-time? Martin has the stats...

Martin's back with some statistical gems...

Martin Tyler's stats and facts column is here! Every week on skysports.com he answers your questions and offers you statistical gems from what he's seen as he tours the world commentating for Sky Sports. Sky Sports' voice of football and his back-up team of experts want your queries on all things statistical and historical from the beautiful game. So if you have spotted something from a match or have been stumped by a pub quiz question, simply email skysportsclub@bskyb.com and he will do his best to help.

Tyler's teaser

But as usual we'll kick off with a question for YOU. Click play to see this week's Tyler's Teaser.

Martin's Starting Stat

I was at Craven Cottage on Monday night to see Adel Taarabt scored his fifth goal of season, with three of them coming against Fulham. Overall it was his 150th game for QPR and his 34th goal. Loic Remy scored his fourth goal in six starts for QPR and Andros Townsend made his 100th league career appearance spread over 10 clubs - and he's only 21! Dimitar Berbatov scored for the fourth consecutive Premier League game, which is the first time in his career that he's ever done that. He also became the first Fulham player to score in four games in a row since Steed Malbranque in 2003. The Bulgarian also took his recent record to six in his last six. QPR conceded their first Premier League penalty of the season in their 31st game. They also won their third of the season, but they've all been saved (Cisse at home to Norwich, Taarabt away to Norwich and Remy away at Fulham). Meanwhile, Fulham have scored all six of their penalties this season - Berbatov with four and one each from Mladen Petric and Steven Sidwell. More on penalties below...

LITTLE SPOT OF BOTHER
Dear Martin. QPR conceded their first penalty of the season on Monday night against Fulham, which seems a long time to go without conceding one. This got me wondering which team has conceded the most in the league this year and I'd also be interested to know if a side has ever gone a whole Premier League season without conceding at least one penalty. Mark (QPR fan) MARTIN SAYS: QPR became the 19th team to concede a penalty in the Premier League this season and only Manchester United are yet to do so. To date, Wigan and Aston Villa have conceded the most in the league this term; the spot-kick conceded by Nathan Baker against Liverpool on Sunday was the seventh they've given away this term.

Premier League 2012/13	Penalties Conceded
Aston Villa	7
Wigan	7
West Bromwich Albion	6
Norwich	6
Stoke	5
Southampton	5
Fulham	5
Sunderland	4
Reading	4
Swansea	4
Arsenal	4
Liverpool	4
Newcastle	3
Tottenham	3
Manchester City	2
West Ham	2
Everton	2
Queen's Park Rangers	1
Chelsea	1
Manchester United	0

Opta have only been keeping data on penalties conceded since the 2003/04 season and in that timeframe, no side has gone for a whole Premier League season without conceding at least one spot-kick. So Manchester United will set a record if they don't give any away in the final seven games of their campaign. In the last 10 seasons we have seen 11 teams go through an entire campaign conceding just ONE penalty. Those teams are as follows: 2004/05 Bolton Wanderers
2004/05 Liverpool
2004/05 Everton
2005/06 Arsenal
2005/06 Blackburn Rovers
2006/07 Liverpool
2007/08 Manchester United
2007/08 Tottenham Hotspur
2008/09 Chelsea
2010/11 Fulham
2011/12 Tottenham Hotspur

A GAME OF ONE HALF
Martin, as a Fulham fan it was no surprise to me to see Fulham do so well in the first half against QPR, only to nearly throw it away in the second half. All season long we have started games well and tailed off towards the end. My mate says we'd be in a Champions League position if games finished at half-time. Can you tell me if he is right? Regards, Simon Johns (Fulham fan) Dear Martin. I'd love to know where Aston Villa would be in the Premier League table if games finished at half-time. I think we'd be well out of the relegation zone. Can you show us a first-half league table?Dave Wright (Aston Villa fan) MARTIN SAYS: Well, as so many of you want to have this question answered I think I had better answer it! Both of you are right to think that your teams would be much better off if their matches finished at half-time. Fulham have only been behind at the break eight times this season and would be seven points better off if games finished at half-time. In fact, they would be fifth in the table if matches finished after 45 minutes - so not quite in the Champions League spots! As for Aston Villa, they are in the relegation zone in real life, but in our "first-half" table they would be in sixth position and heading into Europe! Villa would be 12 points better off if games finished at half-time. They have conceded an astonishing 39 goals in the second half of games this year, compared to just 19 in the first half. Here is the "first-half" table this season, which also doesn't make good reading if you're a fan of Tottenham or Arsenal!

	P	W	D	L	F	A	GD	PTS
Manchester Utd	30	19	8	3	35	14	+21	65
Chelsea	30	16	10	4	31	11	+20	58
Manchester City	30	12	13	5	21	12	+9	49
Everton	30	12	12	6	27	17	+10	48
Fulham	30	12	10	8	21	18	+3	46
Aston Villa	31	10	12	9	17	19	-2	42
Tottenham	31	8	17	6	18	12	+6	41
Liverpool	31	11	8	12	26	21	+5	41
Newcastle	31	10	11	10	17	19	-2	41
Arsenal	30	8	15	7	23	20	+3	39
Sunderland	31	9	11	11	18	22	-4	38
West Bromwich Albion	31	8	13	10	15	21	-6	37
West Ham	30	9	9	12	18	17	+1	36
Stoke	31	6	16	9	12	15	-3	34
Southampton	31	8	10	13	22	30	-8	34
Swansea	31	5	18	8	13	19	-6	33
Norwich	31	6	13	12	15	24	-9	31
Wigan	30	6	12	12	12	23	-11	30
Reading	31	6	10	15	14	26	-12	28
Queens Park Rangers	31	2	18	11	11	26	-15	24

BACK TO FRONT ALL OVER AGAIN
Jan Vertonghen has chipped in with more than a defender's fair share of goals for Tottenham this season, including completing his home and away double against Swansea on Saturday. How often has a defender netted in both fixtures against one team in Premier League history? Chris Bourke MARTIN SAYS: It's a good feat for the Tottenham defender to score home and away against the same team, but he's far from the first man to do it. In fact, according to Opta, this is the 23rd time in Premier League history that a defender has completed such a double. In fact, it is the fourth time this season that a defender has scored home and away against the same side. As a Tottenham fan I'm sure you won't have forgotten that Per Mertesacker scored in both North London derbies this year, although his strike in the White Hart Lane game a couple of weeks ago ended up being a consolation in a 2-1 defeat. Newcastle fans will also be disappointed to be reminded that not one, but TWO Manchester United defenders netted against them in their home and away fixtures this season. Jonny Evans and Patrice Evra scored the first two goals in the 3-0 win for Sir Alex Ferguson's side in October and then repeated the trick in the return game at Old Trafford on Boxing Day, which United won 4-3. Yet again United's first goal was scored by Evans and their second by Evra - and Evans was also credited with an own goal for Newcastle in that game! Despite the glut of defenders scoring home and away this season, only one other defender has achieved the feat since 2007. That man is Glen Johnson who scored in both games for Liverpool against his former club West Ham in the 2010/11 season.

Defender	Team	Opposition	Season
Fairclough	Leeds	Newcastle	1993/94
Morgan	Coventry	Chelsea	1993/94
Barton	Wimbledon	Aston Villa	1994/95
Cooper	Nottingham Forest	Bolton	1995/96
Rieper	West Ham	Coventry	1995/96
Bjornebye	Liverpool	Middlesbrough	1996/97
Leboeuf	Chelsea	Derby	1996/97
Barnard	Barnsley	Everton	1997/98
Gordon	Crystal Palace	Bolton	1997/98
Leboeuf	Chelsea	Sheffield Wednesday	1997/98
Stefanovic	Sheffield Wednesday	Barnsley	1997/98
Irwin	Manchester United	Liverpool	1998/99
Clement	West Bromwich Albion	Manchester City	2002/03
Hyypia	Liverpool	Bolton	2003/04
Samuel	Aston Villa	Charlton	2003/04
Baines	Wigan	Manchester United	2006/07
Gallas	Arsenal	Liverpool	2006/07
Jagielka	Sheffield United	Middlesbrough	2006/07
Johnson	Liverpool	West Ham	2010/11
Evans	Manchester United	Newcastle	2012/13
Evra	Manchester United	Newcastle	2012/13
Mertesacker	Arsenal	Tottenham	2012/13
Vertonghen	Tottenham	Swansea	2012/13

BRILLIANT BELGIANS
Dear Martin. I heard that Belgium is the third highest scoring nation in the Premier League this season. I know Christian Benteke and Marouane Fellaini have scored a lot of goals, but is this really true? Can you tell us which other nationalities have been getting the most goals this year? I imagine Frenchmen would be second behind Englishmen? Marcus (Arsenal fan) MARTIN SAYS: It is absolutely true. This season there have been 55 Premier League goals scored by Belgian players as follows - and Arsenal's Thomas Vermaelen hasn't even contributed any yet! The goals have come from just eight players: Christian Benteke (14)
Romelu Lukaku (13)
Marouane Fellaini (11)
Eden Hazard (8)
Jan Vertonghen (4)
Kevin Mirallas (3)
Mousa Dembele (1)
Vincent Kompany (1) As you suspect, the most goals have come from English players - 238 to be precise - but you're wrong to think that Frenchmen are second on the list. In fact, Spanish players have contributed the second highest total with 71 so far this campaign. Frenchmen have contributed 45 goals ahead of Scotland (39), Republic of Ireland (32) and Wales (28) - which were mostly from Gareth Bale! Despite Luis Suarez's best effort, Argentina leads the way for South America with 27 Premier League goals this campaign. The highest-scoring African nation in the Premier League is Senegal with 24 goals. It must be pointed out that this list has to be constantly updated due to the regulations that allow players to represent nations other than the nation of their birth. Victor Moses could have been classed as an England player, for example, and is now classed as a Nigerian. Premier League goals by nationality (top 20):

Nationality	PL Goals (2012/2013)
England	238
Spain	71
Belgium	55
France	45
Scotland	39
Republic of Ireland	32
Wales	28
Argentina	27
Uruguay	26
Netherlands	25
Senegal	24
Ivory Coast	20
Brazil	13
Bulgaria	13
Germany	13
Bosnia & Herzegovina	12
Croatia	12
Nigeria	12
Northern Ireland	11
Mexico	8

VAN OUT OF GAS?
Dear Martin. Big fan of your column and the commentary work you do each week. I am a big Man United fan and I am still backing Robin van Persie to be top scorer, even though he is having a bit of a goal drought at the moment. Has a player ever gone that long without a goal and still ended up as top Premier League scorer? Keep up the good work, Christian MARTIN SAYS: In terms of the Premier League, Robin van Persie's goal drought is not too long. He has failed to score in his last four games (we await the Premier League's dubious goals panel verdict on the goal against Sunderland, by the way), but it may feel longer because he has played nine games for Manchester United in all competitions without scoring - and I will be at his next game against Manchester City on Monday night. It is not uncommon to see players go four games without scoring and still end up as the Premier League's top scorer. Indeed, Van Persie himself had a four-game barren run for Arsenal last season and still ended up as the league's top goal-getter. Furthermore, Michael Owen went eight games without a goal in 1997/98 and Nicolas Anelka went eight games without a goal in 2008/09 and both of those players claimed the Golden Boot. Below we have listed the top goalscorers in each Premier League season and considered their longest runs without a goal in that season. It's fascinating to note that in 1993/94 Andy Cole never went more than two games without scoring a league goal. And also Alan Shearer went for three straight seasons between 1994/95 and 1996/97 without a goal drought longer than three league games. Longest goal droughts for each Premier League top scorer:

Season	Golden Boot winner	Longest run without scoring
1992/93	Sheringham	5
1993/94	Cole	2
1994/95	Shearer	3
1995/96	Shearer	3
1996/97	Shearer	3
1997/98	Dublin	6
1997/98	Owen	8
1997/98	Sutton	5
1998/99	Hasselbaink	4
1998/99	Owen	6
1998/99	Yorke	5
1999/00	Phillips	3
2000/01	Hasselbaink	4
2001/02	Henry	4
2002/03	Van Nistelrooy	5
2003/04	Henry	5
2004/05	Henry	6
2005/06	Henry	4
2006/07	Drogba	4
2007/08	Ronaldo	5
2008/09	Anelka	8
2009/10	Drogba	4
2010/11	Berbatov	7
2010/11	Tevez	4
2011/12	Van Persie	4

ARE SAINTS SAFE?
Dear Martin. It's been a brilliant few weeks to be a Southampton fan and I can't believe we're up to 12th in the table after beating Chelsea. I'm sure most Southampton fans won't say we're safe yet, but what do the statistics tell us? Has a team ever been this high after 31 games of a season and still gone down? I hope the answer is no! Craig Anka (Southampton fan) MARTIN SAYS: Well Craig, the answer is indeed no! We have never seen a team in 12th place after 31 games of a 38-game Premier League season end up being relegated. In fact, we haven't seen a team in 13th or 14th at this stage end up in the bottom three (so that's good news for fans of Stoke City and Norwich, who currently occupy those positions). However, we have seen two teams in 15th after 31 games end up in the relegation zone at the end of the season. Back in 1995/96, Manchester City were 15th after 31 games with 30 points and even though they picked up a further eight points that season they finished 18th with 38 points. More recently we saw Reading in 15th after 31 games of the 2007/08 season. They had 31 points at that stage and were five points clear of the relegation zone (and eight points clear of Fulham in 19th). However, the Royals picked up just five points from their last seven games and finished 18th - while Fulham won 13 points from their run-in and survived on goal difference!