As usual, here are the match timelines for each of the weekend’s Championship matches. There’s a full explanation of these here, but in a nutshell they track how each team’s expected goals tally (the number of goals that the average team would have scored from their shots) changed over the course of the match.

You can also compare these with how the E Ratings predicted each match would pan out here.

Summary

First of all, here are all of the timelines together, with the same vertical scale to help you pick out which saw the most (and least) goalmouth action:

Individual matches

Birmingham continue to overachieve relative to their underlying performances, thanks primarily to a resilient defence that was in good shape here. After a close first half Ipswich out-created their hosts in the second (despite being a man down) but couldn’t find a way through, ultimately being caught out themselves in a frustrating encounter.

Bolton’s attack finally had a good day at the office! While the Trotters’ defence has looked suspect all season, they have been above average at creating chances but terrible at finishing them. Here they were rewarded for a dominant display in which visitors MK Dons barely got going and appeared fortunate to even scrape their way onto the scoresheet.

Here’s a fun stat for you: all 13 of Brighton’s wins this season have been by a single goal. They scored with only their second shot after half an hour here and look fortunate to have won in the end, with Huddersfield marginally out-creating them, although neither side was able to pose a consistent threat.

This match took a long time to get going, with Cardiff not taking their first shot until 20 minutes and Rotherham having to wait half an hour for theirs. While the visitors ended the game as they started it, i.e. with a long spell of inactivity, their hosts 

A draw looks like the fairest result here, with both sides creating a similar amount overall. Charlton made the faster start here and were the first to find the net, but visitors Blackburn struck back just before the break and went on to enjoy the better of the second half.

Fulham’s defence has looked incredibly suspect this season but they did a good job of containing Hull – albeit at the expense of their own attacking output – and the visitors needed a penalty to finally breach them. Even without the spot kick, which adds over three quarters of a goal to the expected tally, the Tigers were the worthier winners here.

Bristol City can feel a bit hard done by here, having gone into the break in much better shape and creating more overall but ending up with nothing. Leeds scored from the second of their two decent chances, both of which came early in the second half, but were fortunate that their visitors didn’t make more of their own opportunities. After an impressive run of nine clean sheets, Middlesbrough have now lost 1-0 twice in a row. Another shut-out appeared to be on the cards after Forest needed almost the entire first half to register their first attempt on goal, but the visitors somehow found a way through despite being out-created by their hosts.

Brentford stemmed a flow of three consecutive defeats here but they look to have been fortunate in doing so. Preston out-created them in terms of both quality and quantity but the Bees were in ruthless form, aided by an early own goal.

These two sides have performed very similarly overall this season, so perhaps a score draw wasn’t that surprising. However QPR had the better of this contest overall, netting early in an otherwise slow start and creating the more dangerous chances, so they will be the more disappointed with having to share the points.

The huge leap in Reading’s line is the Matej Vydra penalty which struck a post. Without it, the Royals would have ended up with a similar enough expected goals total to visitors Sheffield Wednesday for the final scoreline to be a fair one, but I doubt many of the home fans see it that way. As has often been the case this season, Reading’s dominance of the shot count hasn’t translated itself into the goals column.

Burnley continued their impressive ability to create goals out of relatively few chances here. Their opening goal came shortly after their first shot of the match and up until the first of their two successive penalties they had been comfortably out-created by Derby. The visiting Rams looked to be in control at half time but endured a nightmare of a second half.