After finishing last season in third position, which included a secure spot in the Europa League group stage, Wolfsberger AC suffered a bit of a slow start to the new season. They lost four out of five at the beginning of the term and spent most of this fall below the magic line, i.e. in the lower half of the table. During the last couple they seem however to have turned their fortunes; they only lost one league game since the start of November, winning five out of seven (including an away game against the ruling champion). Similarly, the expected goals table tells a story of a team that will most likely finish in the upper half of the table (they have played one game less, which is why they could jump to fifth already next week). The prospects of competing for international honours again are there.
Next month, they also have another European challenge. They play Tottenham in the round of last sixteen, an encounter that they most likely will not win. Moreover, the question is whether this tie will further affect their domestic performances. Given that they already had a small squad last season, the additional workload might do them more damage than they wished for. The question is therefore if the (most likely) two games will affect their domestic performances this spring season.
To answer the question, I divided the eleven games they have played so far this season into two sub-groups: European games (red in the graph) are those within three to four days after a Europa League fixture. Free Weeks (blue bars) on the other hand are games in which they had had no midweek games (domestic cup games have been played on weekends this season so far). The sample size is quite small (five European games and six Free Weeks) and I did not control for quality of opposition (which might affect the data disproportionately). Results are therefore to be taken with a pinch of salt and will give us only a general idea but given that additional workload is commonly used as a reason or excuse for poor domestic performances, there should be at least something to it.
The data shows that there are actually small differences in their performances, but not the way you would expect. Their points per game tally is basically unchanged, whether they have played European or not. They both won and lost two of their games after midweek fixtures, but they proportion of wins and losses is also the same after free weeks (three to three).
In terms of underlying performances, they tended to play better after European nights, scoring around 0.33 xG (one goal every three games) more and conceding 0.4 less than when they could use the whole week for preparing their game. In those more challenging weeks, they created more footed shots and more from through balls, two more effective ways to score goals. Meanwhile, after long training weeks they were significantly better during set-pieces and counters.
The thing with European games with them so far has been that they struggled on both ends of the pitch to get the goals they deserved. This led them to having an actual (non-penalty) goal difference of 0, while creating a positive expected one (+.22). Heavy legs seem to influence their ability to convert their own chances and prevent the opposition from scoring theirs. On the other hand, they massively overperform in free weeks, converting an expected goal difference of -.42 (a rather poor number) into an actual one of +.16.
Of course, additional games sum up and do not only influence the games in the immediate aftermath. Preparing for more game time by strengthening and broadening their squad is not a bad idea. Their results have however been ok after playing in Europe, with the only outlier being their heaviest defeat so far this season (1:4 at Wattens) after their trip to Moscow. So, rather than fearing the negative impact of European football in the future, they should worry about rather mediocre performances when they don't play in UEFA competitions.
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