Related papers: Soccer matches as experiments: how often does the …
We present ten different strength-based statistical models that we use to model soccer match outcomes with the aim of producing a new ranking. The models are of four main types: Thurstone-Mosteller, Bradley-Terry, Independent Poisson and…
A checkers-like model game with a simplified set of rules is studied through extensive simulations of agents with different expertise and strategies. The introduction of complementary strategies, in a quite general way, provides a tool to…
The approaches routinely used to model the outcomes of football matches are characterised by strong assumptions about the dependence between the number of goals scored by the two competing teams and their marginal distribution. In this…
We analyse the distributions of the number of goals scored by home teams, away teams, and the total scored in the match, in domestic football games from 169 countries between 1999 and 2001. The probability density functions (PDFs) of goals…
We analyse a mathematical model of seeding for sports contests with round-robin qualifying tournaments. The standard seeding system based on coefficients measuring the historical performance of the teams is shown to be unfair as it might…
We analysed the distribution of the number of goals scored in each of the 51 football matches played in the UEFA EURO 2020 final phase as well as the waiting times between scores (also considering censored times). We found that the Poisson…
In the game of cricket, the result of coin toss is assumed to be one of the determinants of match outcome. The decision to bat first after winning the toss is often taken to make the best use of superior pitch conditions and set a big…
The prevalent model by Dixon and Coles (1997) extends the double Poisson model where two independent Poisson distributions model the number of goals scored by each team by moving probabilities between the scores 0-0, 0-1, 1-0, and 1-1. We…
In this work, we compare three different modeling approaches for the scores of soccer matches with regard to their predictive performances based on all matches from the four previous FIFA World Cups 2002 - 2014: Poisson regression models,…
In soccer, game context can result in skewing offensive statistics in ways that might misrepresent how well a team has played. For instance, in England's 1-2 loss to France in the 2022 FIFA World Cup quarterfinal, England attempted…
Statistical applications in sports have long centered on how to best separate signal (e.g. team talent) from random noise. However, most of this work has concentrated on a single sport, and the development of meaningful cross-sport…
This note proposes a penalty criterion for assessing correct score forecasting in a soccer match. The penalty is based on hierarchical priorities for such a forecast i.e., i) Win, Draw and Loss exact prediction and ii) normalized Euclidian…
Bayesian, classical, and extended maximum likelihood approaches to estimation of upper limits in experiments with small numbers of signal events are surveyed. The discussion covers only experiments whose outcomes are well described by a…
A myriad of different data are generated to characterize a soccer match. Here we discuss which performance indicators are particularly helpful to forecast the future results of a team via an estimation of the underlying team strengths with…
We study the effects of randomness on competitions based on an elementary random process in which there is a finite probability that a weaker team upsets a stronger team. We apply this model to sports leagues and sports tournaments, and…
A scoring rule is a function of a probabilistic forecast and a corresponding outcome that is used to evaluate forecast performance. A wide range of scoring rules have been defined over time and there is some debate as to which are the most…
This paper considers the use of observed and predicted match statistics as inputs to forecasts of the outcomes of football matches. It is shown that, were it possible to know the match statistics in advance, highly informative forecasts of…
A family of consistent tests, derived from a characterization of the probability generating function, is proposed for assessing Poissonity against a wide class of count distributions, which includes some of the most frequently adopted…
Game Theory concepts have been successfully applied in a wide variety of domains over the past decade. Sports and games are one of the popular areas of game theory application owing to its merits and benefits in solving complex scenarios.…
Penalties are fraught and game-changing moments in soccer games that teams explicitly prepare for. Consequently, there has been substantial interest in analyzing them in order to provide advice to practitioners. From a data science…