Can You Outpredict Paul the Octopus in the 2014 PF World Cup League?

[DennisN]

Glad you enjoy it! I'm not sure about your switch to Germany, but we'll see how it turns out.

Neither am I . Btw, congrats to your +2 against us all for the Nigeria - Bosnia and Herzegovina match .

 

[micromass]

All teams have played two matches now. A big congratulations to DennisN because he is currently leading! But it's not over yet...

 

[cristo]

Damn, I missed the deadline (a little leeway please, micro?!)

Netherlands v Chile: 3 - 1
Australia v Spain: 0 - 2
Cameroon v Brazil: 1 - 3
Croatia v Mexico: 0 - 0

 

[Logger]

Netherlands - Chile: 1 - 1
Australia - Spain: 0 - 2
Cameroon - Brazil: 0 - 1
Croatia - Mexico: 1 - 2

 

[micromass]

Sorry, it wouldn't be fair to the ones who did made their prediction on times

 

[D H]

June 24th:

Italy v Uruguay: 1 - 2
Costa Rica - England: 2 - 0
Japan - Colombia: 0 - 1
Greece - Côte D'Ivoire: 1 - 2

 

[TheAustrian]

Netherlands - Chile: 1 - 1
Australia - Spain: 0 - 2

Didn't you mean?
Australia - Spain: 2 - 0

 

[cristo]

Sorry, it wouldn't be fair to the ones who did made their prediction on times

Why? I don't get what the advantage is of a few hours, so long as the games haven't started...

 

[Intrastellar]

June 24th:

Italy v Uruguay: 1 - 2
Costa Rica - England: 3 - 1
Japan - Colombia: 1 - 2
Greece - Côte D'Ivoire: 1 - 2

 

[cristo]

Predictions for the rest of the group games (since there is zero tolerance)

Grp C:
Greece v Ivory Coast: 0-2
Japan v Colombia: 2-0

Grp D:
Costa Rica v England: 1-3
Italy v Uruguay: 0-1

Grp E:
Ecuador v France: 1-4
Honduras v Switzerland: 0-3

Grp F:
Bosnia v Iran: 0-1
Nigeria v Argentina: 1-2

Grp G:
Portugal v Ghana: 2-1
USA v Germany: 1-3

Grp H:
Algeria v Russia: 1-0
South Korea v Belgium: 0-2

 

[D H]

June 25th:

[strike]Ecuador v France: 0-1
Honduras v Switzerland: 0-1
Bosnia v Iran: 1-0
Nigeria v Argentina: 0-2[/strike]

Ecuador v France: 0-1
Honduras v Switzerland: 0-1
Bosnia v Iran: 0-1
Nigeria v Argentina: 1-2

 

[Matterwave]

June 25th:

Ecuador v France: 0-3
Honduras v Switzerland: 0-2
Bosnia v Iran: 2-1
Nigeria v Argentina: 1-4

 

[micromass]

25th June:
Nigeria - Argentina: 1 - 3
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Iran: 1 - 1
Honduras - Switzerland: 1 - 0
Ecuador - France: 0 - 4

 

[trollcast]

25th June:
Nigeria - Argentina: 1 - 3
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Iran: 1 - 1
Honduras - Switzerland: 2 - 1
Ecuador - France: 1 - 3

 

[micromass]

What do you guys think for double the amount of points for the matches of the round of 16 and later?

 

[DennisN]

What do you guys think for double the amount of points for the matches of the round of 16 and later?

Fine by me. Would be exciting .

 

[Intrastellar]

What do you guys think for double the amount of points for the matches of the round of 16 and later?

That can give a chance to the people who are way below in the rank, and make the competition more exciting, but it might be unfair for DennisN.

Fine by me. Would be exciting .

Even though he says this

 

[micromass]

That can give a chance to the people who are way below in the rank, and make the competition more exciting, but it might be unfair for DennisN.

Or it might help DennisN get even more points!

 

[D H]

Given my low standing in the group stage, I'm all for it!

I had a similar slow start 4 years ago. I consistently underestimated the scoring in the group stage. I eventually won based on doing very well in the knockout stage. My only saving grace last time around was that we missed the first few days of the group stages. We didn't do that this time. DennisN's lead is quite formidable.


BTW, just to make it clear, the scoring in the knockout stage is based on the score at the end of regulation time if there's a clear winner after 90 minutes+stoppage time, or the score at the end of extra time if the regulation time score is a tie. A game that is tied at the end of extra time is a tie. What happens during the penalty kicks to determine which team advances doesn't count as far as PF World Cup Futbol League is concerned.

Note that this how FIFA determines the final score of these games. Those games that remain tied after the end of 90+30 minutes are officially scored as ties. The kicks from the mark just determine which team advances (or which team wins the trophy).

 

[DennisN]

That can give a chance to the people who are way below in the rank, and make the competition more exciting, but it might be unfair for DennisN.

Yes, it's a little bit unfair, but to me it's the excitement (and chance) of the competition in itself that is fun, so I'm perfectly fine with doubling the points for matches like suggested.

Or it might help DennisN get even more points!

Exactly. I WANT MORE POINTS!

And here's my 25th June predictions:

Nigeria - Argentina: 1 - 2
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Iran: 2 - 1
Honduras - Switzerland: 0 - 2
Ecuador - France: 1 - 3

 

[Logger]

June 24th:

Italy v Uruguay: 1 - 2
Costa Rica - England: 0 - 1
Japan - Colombia: 0 - 1
Greece - Côte D'Ivoire: 1 - 2

25th June:
Nigeria - Argentina: 0 - 2
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Iran: 1 - 1
Honduras - Switzerland: 1 - 1
Ecuador - France: 1 - 2

 

[Logger]

My scores for 23rd June were not added (Post 154 on thread). Not sure if it was because the date was not written down on the top.Can you have a look and if its because of the date then that is fine.(edit)I think I may have missed the deadline.

 

[micromass]

My scores for 23rd June were not added (Post 154 on thread). Not sure if it was because the date was not written down on the top.Can you have a look and if its because of the date then that is fine.(edit)I think I may have missed the deadline.

Yes, you missed the deadline

Nigeria - Argentina: - 2

What is this score?

 

[Logger]

25th June:
Nigeria - Argentina: 0 - 2


Thanks for the update and the spot on my error above. Great stuff on the work you have put into the game.

 

[Intrastellar]

25th June:

Nigeria - Argentina: 1 - 2
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Iran: 1 - 1
Honduras - Switzerland: 1 - 2
Ecuador - France: 1 - 2

Edit: change that to
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Iran: 0 - 3

 

[micromass]

26th June:
Portugal - Ghana: 0 - 1
USA - Germany: 1 - 3
Korea Republic - Belgium: 0 - 3
Algeria - Russia: 1 - 0

 

[D H]

June 26th:

Portugal v Ghana: 1 - 2
USA v Germany: 1 - 1
Korea Republic - Belgium: 0 - 2
Algeria - Russia: 0 - 1

 

[D H]

26th June:
Portugal - Ghana: 0 - 1
USA - Germany: 1 - 3

Booo!

 

[DennisN]

Some tough decisions for tomorrow, but I'll go for:

26th June:
Portugal - Ghana: 1 - 2
USA - Germany: 1 - 2 (sorry - please note I really hope for US )
Korea Republic - Belgium: 0 - 2
Algeria - Russia: 2 - 1

Matterwave gained +2 against us all for the Greece - Côte D'Ivoire match, that's fun .

 

[D H]

Portugal - Ghana: 1 - 2
USA - Germany: 1 - 2 (sorry - please note I really hope for US )

That's an acceptable outcome (just barely) for the US. That would put the US and Ghana tied in total points (4), tied in goal differential (0), tied in goals for (5). The next tie breaker is head-to-head, and since the US beat Ghana, the US advances to the round of 16.

My boo! to micromass a couple of posts back was his prediction would have Ghana advancing instead of the US.

Ghana advances if

• Germany defeats the USA, AND
• Ghana defeats Portugal, AND
  • The margin by which Germany defeats USA plus the margin by which Ghana defeats Portugal is three or more OR
  • The margin by which Germany defeats USA plus the margin by which Ghana defeats Portugal is two AND
    • Ghana scores at least two more goals against Portugal than the USA scores against Germany.

Portugal advances if

• Germany defeats the USA, AND
• Portugal defeats Ghana, AND
  • The margin by which Germany defeats USA plus the margin by which Portugal defeats Ghana is six or more OR
  • The margin by which Germany defeats USA plus the margin by which Portugal defeats Ghana is five AND
    • Portugal scores at least three more goals against Ghana than the USA scores against Germany OR
    • Portugal scores two more goals against Ghana than the USA scores against Germany AND
      • Portugal wins the coin toss against the USA.

The odds of the US advancing are pretty good. Nate Silverman (who normally predicts elections with amazing accuracy) currently puts the US as having a 76% chance of advancing.

There are some bizarre scenarios by which Germany goes home. For example, if the US defeats Germany 2-0 and Ghana defeats Portugal 4-0 then it's bye-bye, Germany. FiveThirtyEight puts the odds of this and similar outcomes as an extremely unlikely 0.3%.

 

[trollcast]

26th june
Portugal v Ghana: 1-2
USA v Germany: 1-3
Korea Republic v Belgium: 0-2
Algeria - Russia: 2-1

 

[Matterwave]

26th june
Portugal v Ghana: 3-2
USA v Germany: 3-1
Korea Republic v Belgium: 0-3
Algeria - Russia: 1-1

 

[Intrastellar]

26th june

Portugal v Ghana: 2-3
USA v Germany: 1-4
Korea Republic v Belgium: 1-2
Algeria - Russia: 2-1

I hope I made it on time, but I doubt that

 

[Logger]

26th june
Portugal v Ghana: 2-1
USA v Germany: 1-1
Korea Republic v Belgium: 0-3
Algeria - Russia: 1-1

 

[DennisN]

Algeria - Russia (26 June): 1 - 1
cristo: 1 - 0
micromass: 1 - 0
DH: 0 - 1
DennisN: 2 - 1
trollcast: 2 - 1
Matterwave: 1 - 1 +2
montadhar: 2 - 1

+2 against us all again, congratulations Matterwave!

 

[Matterwave]

I'm going to catch up! :D

 

[cristo]

Last 16 predictions:

Brazil v Chile: 4-1
Colombia v Uruguay: 1-0
Netherlands v Mexico: 2-0
Costa Rica v Greece: 1-0
France v Nigeria: 3-1
Germany v Algeria: 2-0
Argentina v Switzerland: 3-0
Belgium v USA: 2-1

 

[Borek]

1-0 in all remaining matches, assuming the team names are sorted alphabetically.

 

[D H]

June 28th:
Brazil v Chile: 2-1
Colombia v Uruguay: 1-0

June 29th:
Netherlands v Mexico: 1-0
Costa Rica v Greece: 2-0

 

[micromass]

Congratulations to DennisN for being the best one in the group stages!

Important!
In the following games, each of the following will get you 1 point:

• Identifying correctly who goes through to the next round
• Identifying the outcome correctly (win for Team A, win for Team B, draw), penalties do not count
• Identifying the score correctly (for example 2 - 1), penalties do not count

So it is possible to gain 3 points for a game this round!

Note that if you predict a draw, you have to predict a winner too.

 

[micromass]

June 28th:
Brazil v Chile: 3 - 1
Colombia v Uruguay: 1 - 1 (Uruguay wins)

June 29th:
Netherlands v Mexico: 2 - 1
Costa Rica v Greece: 2 - 0

 

[Intrastellar]

Congratulations to DennisN for being the best one in the group stages!

Important!
In the following games, each of the following will get you 1 point:

• Identifying correctly who goes through to the next round
• Identifying the outcome correctly (win for Team A, win for Team B, draw), penalties do not count
• Identifying the score correctly (for example 2 - 1), penalties do not count

So it is possible to gain 3 points for a game this round!

Note that if you predict a draw, you have to predict a winner too.

This is a better idea than simply multiplying by 2 :)

How about a point for identifying each team's goals ? This way the number of points will be doubled from the group stage, and predicting the goals will become more significant.

 

[Matterwave]

Round of 16 predictions:

Brazil v Chile: 4-3
Colombia v Uruguay: 2-0
Netherlands v Mexico: 1-1 Netherlands advances
Costa Rica v Greece: 1-1 Greece advances
France v Nigeria: 2-1
Germany v Algeria: 4-1
Argentina v Switzerland: 2-1
Belgium v USA: 2-2 USA advances

 

[micromass]

This is a better idea than simply multiplying by 2 :)

How about a point for identifying each team's goals ? This way the number of points will be doubled from the group stage, and predicting the goals will become more significant.

There might be too much emphasis on the goals then. It's not a bad idea, but let's keep it simple.

 

[D H]

Congratulations to DennisN for being the best one in the group stages!

Congrats, DennisN!

Important!
In the following games, each of the following will get you 1 point:

• Identifying correctly who goes through to the next round
• Identifying the outcome correctly (win for Team A, win for Team B, draw), penalties do not count
• Identifying the score correctly (for example 2 - 1), penalties do not count

So it is possible to gain 3 points for a game this round!

Note that if you predict a draw, you have to predict a winner too.

I like it!
This gives the matches in the knockout stage a bit more weight than those in the group stage, it accounts for kicks from the mark to resolve ties, and at the same time it keeps things simple.

 

[phion]

I like it!

Me too.

 

[trollcast]

June 28th:
Brazil v Chile: 3 - 2
Colombia v Uruguay: 1 - 1 Uruguay win on penalties
June 29th:
Netherlands v Mexico: 2 - 1
Costa Rica v Greece: 3 -1

 

[Intrastellar]

June 28th:
Brazil v Chile: 1-2
Colombia v Uruguay: 2-0

 

[DennisN]

Congratulations to DennisN for being the best one in the group stages!

Thanks, micromass and DH!

Important!
In the following games, each of the following will get you 1 point:

• Identifying correctly who goes through to the next round
• Identifying the outcome correctly (win for Team A, win for Team B, draw), penalties do not count
• Identifying the score correctly (for example 2 - 1), penalties do not count

So it is possible to gain 3 points for a game this round!

Note that if you predict a draw, you have to predict a winner too.

That's cool. Regretfully I missed to make predictions for today, and I will post predictions for tomorrow later.

 

[DennisN]

Sport commentators often seem to have a love of statistics, so I thought we could indulge ourselves with our own result table for the group stages:

I hope the table is understandable, and that neither I nor Excel did make any mistakes . The outcome accuracies and result accuracies are calculated with respect to the number of actual votes (that is, blank votes are excluded from the calculation). A fun thing is that PhysicsGente has the top accuracies for both outcomes and results. If anyone finds any error, please PM me. I also attach the Excel sheet and picture to this post.

Another big thanks to micromass for managing this thread, and a good luck to everybody for the rest of the cup!