Allardyce overachieving at Newcastle

[Happy Face 29]

I posted an article a few weeks ago that showed how much Allardyce had overachieved at Bolton. Now here's one that says he's still doing it at Newcastle...even taking into account the weaker opposition we've played.

 

Overachievers turn the tables before reality starts to bite back

 

How are your team really doing? It’s not difficult to find out. Just pick up your newspaper and look at the table. Oh, and then use the Perron-Frobenius theorem.

 

“The league table never lies” is one of the most-used clichés in football. But don’t go thinking that it is true. Of course the league table can lie.

 

Take last season. Manchester United won the title, but Fink Tank computer modelling shows that Chelsea were a better team. At any point, in a game on a neutral ground between the sides, Chelsea would have been favourites.

 

And what about this season? Manchester City are in third spot. Does this mean that they’ve done well, or is it simply that they’ve had an easy schedule playing soft teams?

 

Dr Henry Stott and Dr Ian Graham have been at work in the Fink Tank lab. The Predictor model - the one that gives the probabilities of game outcomes – uses two seasons of goals and shots on target, weighted so that more recent games count more heavily. From this comes a club ranking, showing which are the strongest teams.

 

Since the beginning of the season Chelsea have become, surprisingly, a little stronger than they were last season. But Manchester United have overtaken them, becoming the top team because their defence has improved. Arsenal are still clearly third, although they have made progress. Extraordinarily, Manchester City rank seventeenth.

 

Now look at the season a different way. At the beginning of the campaign, the Predictor model set out how well we expected teams to do by this point. You can create a league table of how clubs are doing compared with expectations.

 

This time Manchester City lead, as the graphic shows. Arsenal are almost two victories up and Blackburn Rovers are doing even better. Meanwhile, it’s interesting that Chelsea and Liverpool haven’t really departed much from their expected total. Chelsea would be running ahead of expectations if it had not been for Tim Cahill’s last-minute equaliser for Everton on Sunday.

 

What, though, about the season’s schedule so far? It is possible to adjust the league table to take into account whether sides have played harder or softer opponents so far. And that’s what the Fink Tank has done, with a little help from our friends Perron and Frobenius.

 

First, you take the league table as it is. Then you add in indirect wins. This means adding in all the points of the team you have beaten. So, when Arsenal beat Reading they have attributed to them not only the three points but all of Reading’s other points. If they had drawn they would have been given one third of Reading’s points.

 

You don’t do this only once, you do this again and again. So you add to Arsenal’s tally not only all of Reading’s direct points but all of their indirect points, too (the ones added to Reading’s tally from other teams they have played). Then you add in all of the points of the sides beaten by teams beaten by Reading. And so on. The Perron-Frobenius theorem says that after you’ve done this for a while, the league table stops changing. Once it is stable, you can stop. The final step is to rescale the points so that the relative positions are maintained.

 

So what did it show? As you can see from the graphic, the adjusted table looks very much like the normal table. We’ve reached the point in the campaign where the schedule has stopped distorting the league much.

 

Manchester City aren’t even close to being the third-best team. But for now, they really are coming third.

 

 

 

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/foo...icle2886671.ece

Edited November 17, 2007 by Happy Face

[Jimbo 133]

"There are lies, damn lies and then there are statistics"

[Gemmill 34133]

The Times published that?

[Gemmill 34133]

I've just re-read it and I'm staggered by what a load of bollocks it really is.

[Happy Face 29]

Fink Tank is class man.

 

Finkelstein is da bomb.

[Park Life 70]

Fink Tank is class man.

 

Finkelstein is da bomb.

 

 

Larry?

[Dr Gloom 19714]

i'd say underachieving given the standard of the team we've played so far (ie none of the 'big 4')

[bobthemag 0]

12 games

[Happy Face 29]

i'd say underachieving given the standard of the team we've played so far (ie none of the 'big 4')

 

None of the big 4, but almost half our games have been against top ten opposition...which is where we want to be...realistically.

[Kevin Carr's Gloves 3176]

i'd say underachieving given the standard of the team we've played so far (ie none of the 'big 4')

 

None of the big 4, but almost half our games have been against top ten opposition...which is where we want to be...realistically.

 

Aye but we have won less than half our games.

[Scottish Mag 3]

i'd say underachieving given the standard of the team we've played so far (ie none of the 'big 4')

 

None of the big 4, but almost half our games have been against top ten opposition...which is where we want to be...realistically.

 

Aye but we have won less than half our games.

 

But have double the points that we had at this point last season. Whilst I am not impressed with some of our performances/team selections it is an improvement.

[Kevin Carr's Gloves 3176]

i'd say underachieving given the standard of the team we've played so far (ie none of the 'big 4')

 

None of the big 4, but almost half our games have been against top ten opposition...which is where we want to be...realistically.

 

Aye but we have won less than half our games.

 

But have double the points that we had at this point last season. Whilst I am not impressed with some of our performances/team selections it is an improvement.

 

I can see where you're coming from but if you look at it more scientifically we are a big steaming pile of shite playing the most god awful hoofball the world has eva (not just ever) seen.

[Guest alex]

i'd say underachieving given the standard of the team we've played so far (ie none of the 'big 4')

 

None of the big 4, but almost half our games have been against top ten opposition...which is where we want to be...realistically.

 

Aye but we have won less than half our games.

 

But have double the points that we had at this point last season. Whilst I am not impressed with some of our performances/team selections it is an improvement.

 

I can see where you're coming from but if you look at it more scientifically we are a big steaming pile of shite playing the most god awful hoofball the world has eva (not just ever) seen.

That's subjective tbf, so it's less scientific I agree in part though.