SPORT AND MODELLING

5:00pm – 5:45pm: “Forecasting the 2003 Rugby World Cup: a profitable application of mathematical modelling”
Professor Stephen R Clarke [Statistics, Swinburne University of Technology, Australia]

For many years Swinburne Sports Statistics have used their mathematical expertise to provide computer generated predictions for sports events to the general public and mass media. The expansion of sports betting has created a market for sports prediction expertise, and there have been several profitable attempts by staff and students at demonstrating the inefficiency of football, cricket and rugby betting markets. This talk describes one of these betting forays, resulting from a graduate student project. A simple forecasting model was built to predict the results of each game and the tournament in the 2003 Rugby World Cup. An exponential smoothing technique was optimized on all 566 games played between the 20 World Cup teams from 1996. The model predicted the winning team, the winning margin and the probability of a win. A simulator used these predicted probabilities to calculate a team’s overall chances of winning or placing in the tournament. Predictions were regularly updated on our web site and received other mass media exposure. The model selected the correct winner in 46 of the 48 games, and the predicted margins were used for profitable gambling. The syndicate continues to successfully apply the methods to other competitions.

5:45pm – 6:15pm: Break for Refreshments

6:15pm – 7:00pm: “Competitive balance in national European soccer competitions”
Professor Dr Ruud Koning [Sport Economics, University of Groningen, The Netherlands]

According to popular belief, competitive balance in national soccer competitions in Europe has decreased due to the Bosman ruling and the introduction of the Champions League. We test this hypothesis using data from seven national competitions, for a host of indicators. We find some evidence for competitive balance having decreased in England, and weak evidence for it having decreased in Netherlands and Belgium. For Germany, France, Italy, and Spain, we find no consistent change whatsoever. We use factor analysis to examine whether our measures of competitive balance can be condensed in a limited number of factors. Also, we examine the development of competitive balance in European competitions such as the Champions League.

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Free:

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