A bit of world cup stats for you. Answer me this who has the
toughest group? Well luckily FIFA helpfully rank each team, based on previous
performance. So if you add up the rankings for each group you get a comparative
value. So Group A has Brazil ranked 11th (Crazy as that might sound),
Croatia 18th, Mexico 24th
and Cameroon 59th. So collectively the ranking for the group totals
112. In theory at least the toughest group should be the one with the lowest
collective ranking.
So here goes in order from easiest to hardest.
- v D (Uruguay, Italy, England, Costa Rica) – 56
- v G (Germany, US, Portugal, Nigeria) – 57
- v B (Spain, Netherlands, Chile, Australia) -78
- v C (Colombia, Greece, Cote d’Ivoire, Japan) -80
- v E (Switzerland, Ecuador, France, Honduras) - 84
- v F (Argentina, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iran, Nigeria) - 101
- v H (Belgium, Algeria, Russia, Korea Republic) -107
- v A (Brazil, Croatia, Mexico, Cameroon) - 112
So clearly Brazil have it easy as do Belgium, But unfortunately,
Its official England are in the group of death. But only just by a hairs
breath, Germany only have it one place easier, and with the US, Portugal and
Nigeria in their group I think I’d prefer Englands.
One Subtle thing that you could toy with is the idea that
the logic that in every group the 4th team is very unlikely to get
very far. Yet they account for the majority of the score, and there is
considerable variance (23 >59). What if you treated them as outliers and
ignored them. What if in effect you assumed that the 4th ranked team
was going to lose every match.
- v B (Spain, Netherlands, Chile, Australia) - 21
- v D (Uruguay, Italy, England, Costa Rica) – 25
- v G (Germany, US, Portugal, Nigeria) – 34
- v C (Colombia, Greece, Cote d’Ivoire, Japan) -36
- v E (Switzerland, Ecuador, France, Honduras) - 50
- v H (Belgium, Algeria, Russia, Korea Republic) - 51
- v F (Argentina, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iran, Nigeria) - 52
- v A (Brazil, Croatia, Mexico, Cameroon) - 53
Well the answer is not much changes, the toughest group
becomes group B, with Spain and Netherlands in it hard to see Chile overcoming
them. Group H also looks slightly worse off too but still Brazil have bar far
the easiest group, even accounting for their own poor seeding they retain the
easiest group.
None of this helps to work out who is going to win, that
will be Brazil anyway, but the stats in sport are what I enjoy so a little
distraction never hurt anyone.
