Premier League teams are all attacking with long throw-ins this season, but very few are scoring goals from them consistently. Will this just prove a short-lived fad?
As you may well be aware, long throw-ins have made a bit of a comeback this season.
The numbers, as well as the eye test, prove there has been a big increase this term. In each of the previous five seasons, no more than 1.52 long throws had been attempted per Premier League game, when defining a ‘long throw’ as a throw-in aimed into the opposition’s penalty area and measuring at least 20 metres in length (before the next touch of the ball). This season, there have been 3.92 in each match, well over double the highest previous rate.
It’s been impossible to miss. Everyone is at it. Every team in the Premier League this season has put in at least five long throws, according to our above definition. Nine teams are putting in at least two per game. Four teams have attempted more than 100 in total – all averaging well over three per game.
Only, not everyone is doing it well. Brentford certainly are, having scored five goals after launching a long throw into the opposition’s box this term. They were also the best at it last season, when they scored six goals from such situations.
Given they supplemented their goal return last term with almost as many goals from long throws as every other Premier League team put together (seven), it’s reasonable to assume they are at least part of the reason everyone is at it in 2025-26.
“If Brentford can turn their throw-ins in the attacking third into half a dozen goals, then why can’t we?” Understandably, many clubs sought to answer that question this season.
As it turns out, being good at long throws isn’t quite as simple as finding out someone in your squad can hurl the ball from the touchline into the middle of the six-yard box. While it is a quick way to get the ball very, very close to goal, the numbers prove this is an incredibly inefficient way of attacking. It was before this season and it remains so now, even if there are now more goals from long throws.
There have been 1,179 long throws in 301 Premier League games this season, and just 24 goals from such situations. That’s one goal every 49.1 long throw attempts, or a goal from a long throw every 12.5 matches. And that’s only if you’re as good as the Premier League average. Tottenham have attempted 74 long throws in league games this season, and haven’t scored from a single one.
Corners are also a very inefficient route to goal, despite their growing popularity in recent seasons, but these two set-piece types, long throw-ins look even more of a waste of time.
There have been 2,564 corners that have been crossed directly into the box in Premier League games this season, and they have produced 123 goals. That’s a goal every 20.8 crossed corners, or one every 2.4 matches. They produce goals much, much more often than throw-ins, so launching a long throw into the box is not anything like as good as doing so with a corner.
The thing is, though, if you do an inefficient thing enough, it will eventually produce a higher output. If you threw a tennis ball at a brick wall enough times, it would eventually knock it down, but that fact doesn’t make it an efficient way of knocking down a wall.
There have already been at least 500 more long throws in the Premier League this season than in any of the previous 10 seasons, and we’ve still got 79 matches left to play this term. That has led to more goals from long throws than in any of those seasons, with 24 in total, at a rate of 0.08 per game.
One might argue here that any improvement is a worthwhile improvement. Seven of the 17 ever-present Premier League teams have scored more goals from long throws this season than they did last. Manchester United may not have beaten Newcastle 1-0 on Boxing Day were it not for Patrick Dorgu’s exceptional volley, which came from a long throw-in. It would be difficult to convince them that Diogo Dalot should not have launched the ball into the box from a throw that day.
But the truth is the increases have been minute. Fourteen goals from long throws last season has become 24 this season, and that should increase to 30 by the end of the campaign if they continue to be scored at the current rate. It’s not a groundbreaking increase.
Perhaps more significantly, the number of long throws that didn’t lead to a goal has skyrocketed from 564 last season to 1,155 already this season. That’s a whole lot of wasted time and effort.
Talking of wasted time, the ball has been out of play before throw-ins for an average of 642.2 seconds in each Premier League game this season. That’s 10 minutes and 42 seconds of waiting for throw-ins in every match.
Obviously, not all of that time is waiting for long throws, but given it is almost two minutes more of waiting for throw-ins than last season (eight minutes, 49 seconds per game), it looks very much like the focus on long throws is resulting in the ball being out of play for significantly longer in every match.
Also, this is only an average, so some games have seen much longer delays for throw-ins. Twenty-two different Premier League matches in 2025-26 have been delayed for more than 15 minutes just waiting for throw-ins. Some of those could have been affected by lengthy injuries or VAR checks when the ball has gone out for a throw, but that can’t be the reason for all of those matches seeing such long delays.
The point here goes beyond just complaining about the entertainment on offer when watching Premier League football. There are legitimate concerns about this from the viewers’ perspective, but that isn’t really the responsibility of the clubs or managers. Their priority is winning matches.
But there is also a possibility that so many long throws could actually be making it more difficult to win matches.
After the last four seasons were the four highest-scoring in Premier League history (from 2021-22 to 2024-25), the current season is, at present, producing the 13th-highest rate of goals (2.73 per game).
That may not be the direct result of the increase in long throws, but it certainly looks like it could be a contributing factor. The increase is part of the growing focus on set-pieces this season, which has either coincided with or directly resulted in teams being less capable of scoring from open play. We are seeing fewer goals from open play this season (1.7 per game) than in any Premier League season since 2009-10.
If teams spent less time working on long throws in training, they might get better at scoring from open play. Similarly, if players are being selected for their set-piece threat, that might make the team worse in open play.
If teams also spent less time getting ready for a long throw, they’d have more time with the ball on the pitch to try and score. And what’s more, taking a throw-in quickly and short doesn’t necessarily mean the team won’t get the ball closer to goal; it might just take them a few seconds longer.
In the interest of balance, it’s worth pointing out that, as is the case with most data, there are limitations here. The numbers we’ve been looking at don’t take into account, for example, that a long throw might be headed straight out for a corner, which the team scores from. Or that a long throw might be the only reason two centre-backs are in the opposition’s box a few phases of play later to score. There are also intangibles like the pressure that a long throw might help a team build, which might eventually contribute to the opposition collapsing and a goal being scored.
There is also the fact that more managers appear to be prioritising solid defences than free-flowing attacks, and it may not be realistic to score as many open-play goals while doing so. Hence the increased use of long throws.
All Premier League teams might become more effective at long throws in the coming years. Many are only just starting out on their long-throw journey, and they may eventually become as effective as Brentford.
But for now, the evidence suggests long throws might just be more trouble than they are worth for just about every Premier League side. It will be interesting to see how long they remain a common and frequent method of attack in the top flight.
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Are Long Throws Actually a Waste of Everyone’s Time? Opta Analyst.
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