An independent statistician using data to understand our world and to predict the future
The 2024/25 football season is over and it is 76 days since my team Newcastle Utd last won a trophy! For the first time in my life, I am able to record Newcastle United in a winners column in my spreadsheet listing all English trophy winners (Men’s) since 1889. For the first time ever, Crystal Palace appear as a trophy winner.
[Read more…] about Trophy Winners #1 – England Men’s Club Football 1889 to 2025
The 2024/25 Women’s Super League (WSL) ended with Chelsea winning their 2nd ever Domestic Treble after their 1st in 2021 and Arsenal winning the Champions League for the 2nd time ever after their 1st in 2007.
If you are new to the women’s game in England (especially following the Lionesses winning the European Championship in 2022), why not download my spreadsheet listing all trophy winners since 1992 to find out which teams are the GOATs of English women’s football?
[Read more…] about Trophy Winners #2 – England Women’s Club Football 1992 to 2025
Manchester City have won the Champions League at long last after beating Inter Milan 1-0 in Istanbul. They become the 6th English club to reach the summit of the European club landscape and it their 17th trophy in 13 years. Does that mean we can now call Man City a Dynasty comparable to the two undisputed dynasties of Liverpool in the 70s & 80s and Manchester United in the 90s & 00s? I am sure Man City fans will say yes but I say not yet.
[Read more…] about Sporting GOATs #2 – Are Man City now a Dynasty?
Will there be any football this Christmas? The Omicron variant of COVID19 is wreaking havoc with football and rugby schedules and the traditional Boxing Day lineup is in danger of being cancelled. So what will football fans do instead? The good news is I am giving a Christmas present to all football supporter that is almost as good as the real thing. All you need are 2 packs of playing cards, a pen and paper or a spreadsheet and you can play a simple football simulation game which guarantees fun and excitement for all.
With only 3 or 4 games to go for the teams of the Premier League, most of the season’s excitement has dissipated. Man City have wrapped up the title, the top 7 who will be playing in Europe next season is more or less settled and the former 10-team dogfight for relegation has resolved itself with a 4 point gap between the bottom 3 and the rest. Probably, the only remaining uncertainties are who will take 4th place (Spurs or Chelsea) and will Southampton escape relegation at the expense of Swansea?
[Read more…] about EPL 2017/18 #5 – My Prediction of the Final League Table – Round 36
After many weeks of a relegation dogfight involving up to 10 teams, it now appears that an exciting finish to the 2018 EPL season is becoming less likely as a gap opens up between the bottom 3 and the rest. After 34 matches, another gap is opening up between the 4 prediction methods I use and one method so far has a 74% success rate in predicting the match outcome.
[Read more…] about EPL 2017/18 #4 – My Prediction of the Final League Table – Round 33
My first published attempt to predict the outcomes of Premier League matches got off to a good start last week with 23% of my predictions getting the right scoreline and 52% getting the right outcome. I have updated my prediction of the final league which continues to point to an incredibly tight relegation battle, especially for my team Newcastle United.
[Read more…] about EPL 2017/18 #3 – My Prediction of the Final League Table – Round 30
With 10 games to go, the 2018 EPL is now entering its final quarter and supporters of all teams are starting to wonder where their team will finish in the league. As a Newcastle United supporter, my team is stuck right in the middle of one of the tightest relegation battles in living memory. At the other end of the table, my wife’s team Spurs are almost certainly out of the running for the title but Champions League qualification is definitely in their sights. To set expectations, I have used a statistical method known as Poisson modelling to predict the final league table come May 13th and I will update this post after every round of games between now and then so please bookmark this page.
[Read more…] about EPL 2017/18 #2 – My Prediction of the Final League Table – Round 29
My team Newcastle United are also known as the Magpies but how much of a GOAT are they? In recent years, this acronym has become popular as a shorthand for Greatest Of All Time. Given that the Magpies have not won a trophy in the 40+ years that I have supported them, I know they are not the number 1 GOAT in English football but where would they sit in a GOAT table?
Ranking tables are extremely common in sport and sport analytics as they are easily understood by fans. If I want to compile a ranking of all English football clubs, there are two decisions I have to make:
In this post I will use 3 eras and 3 metrics to creating 9 GOAT tables in all. Read on to find out which club is #1 GOAT! [Read more…] about Sporting GOATs #1 – English football clubs
The 2017/18 English Premier League (EPL) kicked off yesterday with Arsenal beating Hull 4-3. Tomorrow, my team Newcastle United will be playing my wife’s team Tottenham Hotspur so marital harmony could be in short supply! Be that as it may, what should fans of the Magpies and Spurs be expecting this season? Newcastle are a recently promoted team whilst Spurs were runners up last season Is there a way to set realistic expectations for the 2017/18 season?
[Read more…] about EPL 2017/18 #1 – What are you expecting for your team this season?
