2024/25 mid-season review: Bohemians Praha 1905
In summer, all the talk centred around Ďolíček. There were some juicy returns of Drchal, Yusuf or Čermák to distract fans a little bit, but majority of attention was paid to the stadium and its future. Late in 2024, it was very much the same song. While Bohemians did make some intriguing moves to get younger, ditching a few veterans and winning the race for a coveted 21-year-old in Peter Kareem, Ďolíček was front and center again. In November, a new 60-year-old lease was announced, with an hour-long press conference laying down the concrete vision for a new arena following up in December. But how have things gone on the pitch?
The outlook
After two consecutive years of pretty considerably adjusting up (by 5.1 projected points) and then down again (by 4.9 projected points), the third time was the lucky charm. Bohemians’ 24/25 projection was nailed on, with only Slovácko’s one needing a similarly cute adjustment (minus-0.8) for the model to be completely happy 2/3s through the campaign. Now, it figures to be stressed that Kuba’s model works only with real points; if it were to incorporate xG/xP to at least some extent, the forecast would’ve likely read a lot differently. Bohemians are 5 pts and places better off in the xP table.
One thing the xP table, suggesting an upcoming positive regression, doesn’t account for is the strength of the remaining schedule, though. And on that front, Bohemians may struggle. All of their away stands are with top-half clubs with the exception of Pardubice. At home, they should comfortably dispatch Budějovice early on (though it feels important to note ‘Bohemka’ have already left points on the table to the entire bottom 3), but then it gets rougher. Taking care of two Prague quote-unquote derbies with Sparta and Dukla could be interpreted as both good (SPA) and bad (DUK) news at the same time. On balance, this is still the third toughest fixture list per model.
What’s interesting is that despite missing just 6 points on Mladá Boleslav, Bohemians are only given a measly 2% chance of landing inside Top 6. Before their remarkable 2023 spring surge, they also had 22 points at Christmas (from 16 games instead of 19), but the zero-point margin between them and Top 6 made for a very different prospect of taking part in the Championship group (28%). That percentage, along with the UEFA competition projection (9%), still proved to be too pessimistic, but right now we would be clutching at straws. The deck is stacked against ‘Klokani’.
The big question
Can they catch up to their reputation and be actually hard to play against?
Ever since breaking through for the unlikely 4th place in 2022/23, Jaroslav Veselý’s Bohemians have enjoyed something of a reputation. Annoying off the ball, always ready to pounce on a loose ball and press up high, peppering your defence with crosses from especially the left side. Much of this is still true, but what’s quite peculiar for a so-called hard-to-play-against side is Veselý’s continuous inability to fix the defence. In my summer preview, I noted Bohemians’ defence was “somewhat shockingly bottom 6 in both Veselý-led campaigns”; there is no longer a shock, really.
Once again, they bleed chances through the middle at a bottom 4 rate. Once again, their right-hand side is a bottom 3 problem. Once again — like in 22/23 — they are intense up high but also down below, fouling far too much inside their defensive half (2,5 times per game) to concede territory.
This is despite Bohemians not losing any huge contributors over the summer. Lukáš Hůlka is still around, and so are Matěj Hybš, Jan Vondra, Antonín Křapka, Adam Kadlec or Jan Kovařík. Daniel Köstl was more a case of addition by subtraction after a sub-par 2023/24 than anything. ‘Klokani’ always have a few too many injuries to overcome, but that’s about it.
An interesting detail to note at this point is that all this is true despite Bohemians facing very little adversity. In spite of frequent fouling, ‘Klokani’ have yet to spend a single minute in man disadvantage, which normally has great implications on xGA values — Karviná and, to a lesser extent, Olomouc could recount. Bohemians’ didn’t need to shuffle around.
One important aspect that has received a fix after all is the previously big portion of high-danger chances allowed from set pieces. Nowadays, Bohemians are a Top 2 side in producing and allowing shots off corner kicks, while set pieces on average constitute only a quarter of their matchup xGA (24.8%), which is the 2nd best rate after noted set piece specialists Jablonec. It’d just be great if it didn’t go hand in hand with increased vulnerability towards counter-attacks and positional attacks.
The wild card
The frequent formation switches do (not) go away
On one level, Bohemians are one of the most predictable outfits out there. They look to close the shop on the road, posting the third best xGA, while mostly looking to attack freely at home, posting the fifth best xGF despite playing a host to almost the entire current Top 6 to open the campaign (which shows on the second worst xGA, for a change, to be totally fair).
On another level — and in a bit more real sense — Bohemians are also one of the least predictable outfits out there; for their opponents as well as for themselves. As far as starting formation goes, coach Veselý has flicked between a back four and three-at-the-back scheme six times. Per Wyscout’s (imperfect) formation tracking, Bohemians ditched the initial system somewhat dramatically four times over the last 11 rounds — most notably in blowout losses to Slavia (0:4) and Hradec (0:3) as well as the Karviná near-disaster (3:3 after trailing 1:3 at half-time despite opening the score early). Against Hradec, 4-3-3 turned 3-4-3 halfway through. Against Karviná, it was the original 3-5-2 that backfired, making way for a 4-2-3-1. #Consistency.
It’s no wonder these changes were often born out of sheer panic, as Bohemians struggled mightily to bank points at home (just 2 wins out of 10), and generally turn chances into goals inside the first halves. They are this league’s biggest 1st-half underperformers in real terms (Dynamo can’t be counted), with their sum goal difference before the break (minus-5) leaving a lot to be desired vis-à-vis their sum xG difference (circa plus-1). They were down at half time six times, managing to claim just 3 points. The Slavia (0:3), Hradec (0:2) and Plzeň (0:2) matchups were basically buried by 45' min, with Bohemians totalling a hardly believable 0.15 xGF combined.
Veselý was increasingly livid with his players towards the end of 2024, with the rare chances for guys like Denis Vala or Matěj Kadlec looking (at least initially) more as signs of desperation to issue a wake-up call than anything substantial. It shall be fascinating to see which formation is the go-to one coming out of the break… if there is such a thing for Bohemians at all.
MVP race
Pole position: Abdallah Yusuf Helal — 703,3 pts — ranked 21st league-wide
Prominent chaser: Jan Kovařík — 576,5 pts — ranked 33rd
Initially, it looked as though the two star returnees — Abdallah Yusuf Helal and Václav Drchal — won’t be able to effectively co-exist on the pitch. In the end, it clicked, with Yusuf providing the top notch hold-up play while Drchal runs off him. The latter has carved out a niche of tormenting the right channel (often in Jan Matoušek’s absence, offsetting its effect greatly), and ultimately almost caught up to Yusuf in terms of goal contributions. Despite only notching his first point in Round 10, Drchal has managed to collect seven of them (five important), while Yusuf sits on 9 (seven vital).
This is a fantastic base for Bohemians, one that gives them 3 members of the MVP leaderboard’s Top 50 along with the eternal Jan Kovařík. The left-footed phenom turns 37 in June, yet still makes for the 7th most used Bohemians player on the current roster, and one of the most accurate crossers of the ball around. Much like in 23/24 and unlike 22/23, his dead ball contributions to goals/chances created (16+1) are squarely rivalled by those arising from open play (10+3); the sustainable kind of production.
Bold prediction temperature check
Prediction: Reichl will at least double his longest clean sheet streak
Status: Hard to tell right now
On the face of it, this is a fail. Michal Reichl began the season as a no. 1, was a big contributor to a surprise Baník scalp in the opener, then acted as the main villain in the Dukla upset, letting a long-range pass sail past him, and didn’t live to see Round 5 as the designated starter, while Bohemians readied to onboard the most expensive signing of the modern era. At that point in time, Reichl had arguably figured to never see competitive action.
But then Tomáš Frühwald proceeded to thoroughly underwhelm, allowing more than 4 goals above expected and getting dropped for the last autumn game (though Reichl was far from assured then), while Lukáš Soukup — the man who originally unseated Reichl — was told, along with veteran Roman Valeš, to search for a new employer this winter. Suddenly, Reichl might be back in the mix. Now, is it likely Bohemians return to Frühwald at some point? I would say it is — maybe even to open the spring. But let’s remind ourselves the doubling of Reichl’s personal longest Bohemians clean sheet streak means no big deal — it requires him to hold on for just around 330 mins. Even Le Giang managed 455 behind a very mediocre 2020/21 side…
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