What started with 32 teams nearly four weeks ago has now come down to four teams and four matches over the next six days. I'd like to provide some commentary on the remaining teams, their performance to date, and some predictions for the semifinal round.
Demographics
While I am not using the Soccernomics model to predict outcomes in any of these final knockout rounds, I do find the demographics of each team to be fascinating. Here are the three constituents to the Soccernomics model for each of the four remaining teams (in descending order for each attribute).
- Germany: 81,757,600
- Spain: 46,030,109
- The Netherlands: 16,616,850
- Uruguay: 3,361,000
In this category we see the Western European nations dominating with their size and population density. It turns out that Uruguay was the second smallest nation to participate in this year's tournament - only tiny Slovenia has fewer people to draw upon for their national team.
- The Netherlands: $48,223
- Germany: $40,875
- Spain: $31,946
- Uruguay: $9,426
Again, the Western Europeans dominate. The Uruguayans come in dead last in both population and GDP per capita, meaning the talent pool they pull from and resources they can dedicate to such a talent pool will be smaller than the other three nations.
- Germany: 709 matches
- Uruguay: 688 matches
- The Netherlands: 587 matches
- Spain: 461 matches
Here's where Uruguay shines. Only four teams - England, Argentina, Brazil, and Germany - have played more international games than Uruguay. Ironically, all five teams are part of the elite group of seven to have won a World Cup (Italy and France being the other two), and four out of those five made it at least to the quarterfinals in this year's tournament (sorry, English fans). Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay have combined to win half of the World Cups contested to date. Of Uruguay's total international experience, they have played 181 matches against Argentina and 66 against Brazil (only their experience against Paraguay comes close with 63 matches). These matches mean that 36% of Uruguay's international experience comes against perennial World Cup championship contenders. While some may be surprised that CONMEBOL's representative in this year's final rounds is not Brazil or Argentina, they shouldn't be so surprised. Given the right manager and team, Paraguay should do as well as they have due to consistently challenge themselves to play against nations that are much larger than them and who continually challenge for soccer's top prize.
Not that I am counting, but some may be interested in how this adds up for a Soccernomics line. Here you go:
- Netherlands (+0.3) over Uruguay
- Germany (+0.4) over Spain
Regular readers will recall from my previous posts that such small spreads in predicted goal differential mean the model can't accurately predict the outcome of the match. Instead, let's take actual tournament data to understand how each team has performed so far and is trending as the knockout rounds go on.
Play-to-date
As in previous posts, I turn to the Footballer-Rating system for objectively evaluating team's performances in matches. It appears that their website is about a match behind as they have only posted results through the round of 16 (curious US fans should note that the differential between the US and Ghana ratings were 0.4 in favor of the Ghanaians, although both teams recorded negative ratings). Figures 1 and 2 below show the semifinalists' ratings and rating differential by match, with the dashed lines representing the three match running average trendline for each team.
Figure 1: Semifinalist Footballer-Rating score by match with 3 match running average dashed trendline
Figure 2: Semifinalist Footballer-Rating score differential by match with 3 match running dashed average trendline
The figures provide a useful comparison to the results realized so far in the tournament by each team.
Spain is killing the opposition in rating differential and absolute ratings, but this has translated to three narrow onw goal wins and two losses. This is likely due to the fact that Spain has passed the most, had the highest touch differential, been the most accurate passer in these finals, and the Footballer-Rating system rewards passing as well as scoring goals. It's an aberration in an otherwise mediocre performance so far for the second best team in the world according to the FIFA rankings.
Uruguay, on the other hand, has performed erratically and thus has shown relatively small ratings differential versus the competition. It shows in the basic statistics as well - Uruguay ranks at or near the bottom versus the other three semifinalists in every major category. The Footballer-Ratings scores indicate the up-and-down nature of the tournament so far for Uruguay and its fans. It seems that the Uruguayans have been able to make goals (or stop them in the case of the quarterfinal match against Ghana) when they really counted.
Save for their final group play match against Cameroon, the Dutch have completely outclassed their opponents by winning their matches with a Footballer-Rating differential of 0.7 or greater. Their absolute ratings are a bit lower, suffering from tough second and third matches in the Group Play stage. They began to turn things around with a dominant Round of 16 match, nearly equalling their opening match drubbing of Denmark. The Dutch are the only team left to have won all of their matches so far, consistently rank in the middle two spots of the four teams left when it comes to key statistics, but have the highest goals-against average of the four remaining teams.
The German ratings are a bit odd given their performance to date. Something odd happened in the Round of 16 match against England, as Germany dominated the match yet received a -0.9 rating differential. Conversely, their 4-0 opening match win against Australia earned them a +1.5 rating differential. Regardless of the ratings, the German attack has been relentless and has yielded 13 goals with three 4-goal dominating performances. The Germans rank at the top of the shooting categories, and in the middle of the passing ones.
Predictions
Last round I only went 1 for 4 as I picked too many favorites and the wrong upset. I will try not to make that mistake this time.
Figure 3 shows the Footballer rating moving average for the last three matches as scored by the Amaral Lab.
Figure 3: Three match moving average of Footballer-Rating scores
The Spain/Germany semifinal will be interesting to watch. Both squads have been impacted by similar passing/attacking styles originating in The Netherlands - it should make for an exciting match. Outstanding, experienced play is what it will take to beat the young and fast Germans. I think it is too much to ask of the Spaniards to flip the switch at this point in the tournament and go from mediocre play to outstanding play. I see Germany's offense overwhelming Spain for an upset according to Footballer-Rating.
In The Netherlands/Uruguay match I am going to take the favorite. I think the Dutch are playing too well, too consistently to not make it through to the final. Along with the Germans, they seem to have been the best TEAMS of the tournament - each player knowing their role and supporting the team accordingly. While I know my Dutch friends approach each match with apprehension waiting for the classic Dutch breakdown, this team has seemed very focused on the matter at hand and resilient when presented with a challenge (i.e. being down 1-0 to Brazil). I think they're simply too good, and they will eliminate an Uruguayan team that has fed off luck and bucking the statistics in this tournament.
If my predictions turn out correct, it'll make for a repeat of the 1974 World Cup final match. If that is the case, it would be an exciting match to watch. It would be a shame to have to see such a gifted German team lose, but I think much of the world would be pulling for the scrappy Dutch to finally deliver the world championship they have come close to winning several times before.
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