Mark Lawrenson Predictions: Episode 7

Depression for Liverpool
Predictions here

There were no Monday matches this week, but I'm still late - sorry!
Correct predictions are in bold.

Home Team	Away Team	Predicted winner	Predicted score	Actual winner	Actual score
Birmingam	Everton	Everton	0-2	Everton	0-2
Stoke	Blackburn	Draw	1-1	Stoke	1-0
Sunderland	Man Utd	Man Utd	1-2	Draw	0-0
Tottenham	Aston Villa	Tottenham	2-0	Tottenham	2-1
West Brom	Bolton	Draw	1-1	Draw	1-1
West Ham	Fulham	West Ham	2-1	Draw	1-1
Wigan	Wolverhampton	Wigan	2-0	Wigan	2-1
Man City	Newcastle	Man City	2-0	Man Utd	2-1
Liverpool	Blackpool	Liverpool	3-1	Blackpool	1-2
Chelsea	Arsenal	Chelsea	2-0	Chelsea	2-0

Mark's winner prediction success: 6/10 (over all seven weeks: 49.9%)
Mark's score prediction success: 3/10 (over all seven weeks: 15.7%)

This is ML's best week yet, with the most correct scores that he's ever had. Unfortunately, however, this hasn't helped Liverpool, who are down at the bottom of the league. They have 31 more games to get themselves back in shape. Also, Fulham and Man Utd are the only teams to have not lost a game this season.

Next weekend: Euro 2012 qualifiers are on Friday/Saturday and Tuesday. Previews and after-match posts to come. Also, it's the Japanese Grand Prix for Formula 1, also known as stupidly early racing (that I might get up for).

Mark Lawrenson Predictions: Episode 6

Mark Lawrenson did such a bad job of predicting the scores this week that I'm not going to bother posting them. He only got one correct winner, and no correct scores.

This, admittedly, is probably because Arsenal and Chelsea both lost, when they've been having good runs so far this season.

Mark Lawrenson Predictions: Episode 5

Chelsea are awesome :(
Predictions here

There were no Monday matches this week, but I'm still late - sorry!
Correct predictions are in bold.

Home Team	Away Team	Predicted winner	Predicted score	Actual winner	Actual score
Stoke	West Ham	West Ham	2-0	Draw	1-1
Aston Villa	Bolton	Aston Villa	2-0	Draw	1-1
Blackburn	Fulham	Fulham	2-1	Draw	1-1
Everton	Newcastle	Everton	3-1	Newcastle	0-1
Tottenham	Wolverhampton	Tottenham	2-0	Tottenham	3-1
West Brom	Birmingam	Draw	1-1	West Brom	3-1
Sunderland	Arsenal	Draw	1-1	Draw	1-1
Man Utd	Liverpool	Draw	0-0	Man Utd	3-2
Wigan	Man City	Man City	0-2	Man City	0-2
Chelsea	Blackpool	Chelsea	3-0	Chelsea	4-0

Mark's winner prediction success rate: 4/10
Mark's score prediction success rate: 2/10

Chelsea continue their winning stream. Mark Lawrenson is doing badly. Next weekend - F1 from Singapore and Premier League.

Mark Lawrenson Predictions: Episode 4

Prediction vs Reality
Predictions here

I am a horrendously late blogger this week. My excuse is that it's my first week of a new university term, so I've been busy.
Correct predictions are in bold.

Home Team	Away Team	Predicted winner	Predicted score	Actual winner	Actual score
Everton	Man Utd	Draw	1-1	Draw	3-3
Arsenal	Bolton	Arsenal	3-1	Arsenal	4-1
Fulham	Wolverhampton	Fulham	2-1	Fulham	2-1
Man City	Blackburn	Man City	2-0	Draw	1-1
Newcastle	Blackpool	Newcastle	2-1	Blackpool	0-2
West Brom	Tottenham	Draw	1-1	Draw	1-1
West Ham	Chelsea	Draw	1-1	Chelsea	2-0
Wigan	Sunderland	Sunderland	1-2	Draw	1-1
Birmingham	Liverpool	Liverpool	0-2	Draw	0-0
Stoke	Aston Villa	Stoke	2-0	Stoke	2-1

Mark's winner prediction success rate: 5/10
Mark's score prediction success rate: 2/10

Mark Lawrenson didn't do as well predicting winners today, but he's doing okay. As the year progresses, I'm expecting that he'll improve too. He has a 48% winner success rate overall, and a 15% score success rate.

Mark Lawrenson Predictions: Episode 3

Prediction vs Reality
Predictions here

Correct predictions are in bold.

Home Team	Away Team	Predicted winner	Predicted score	Actual winner	Actual score
Blackburn	Arsenal	Arsenal	1-2	Arsenal	1-2
Blackpool	Fulham	Draw	1-1	Draw	2-2
Chelsea	Stoke	Chelsea	3-0	Chelsea	2-0
Tottenham	Wigan	Tottenham	3-0	Wigan	0-1
Wolverhampton	Newcastle	Wolverhampton	2-1	Draw	1-1
Man Utd	West Ham	Man Utd	3-0	Man Utd	3-0
Bolton	Birmingham	Bolton	2-0	Draw	2-2
Liverpool	West Brom	Liverpool	2-0	Liverpool	1-0
Sunderland	Man City	Draw	1-1	Sunderland	1-0
Aston Villa	Everton	Villa	2-1	Villa	1-0

Mark's winner prediction success rate: 6/10
Mark's score prediction success rate: 2/10

Mark Lawrenson improved today, getting more than half the winners correct, and two of the scores. Not bad! He has a 47% winner success rate overall, and a 13% score success rate.

Mark Lawrenson Predictions: Episode 2

Prediction vs Reality
Predictions here

Correct predictions are in bold.

Home Team	Away Team	Predicted winner	Predicted score	Actual winner	Actual score
Arsenal	Blackpool	Arsenal	3-0	Arsenal	6-0
Birmingham	Blackburn	Birmingham	2-1	Birmingham	2-1
Everton	Wolverhampton	Everton	2-0	Draw	1-1
Stoke	Tottenham	Draw	1-1	Tottenham	1-2
West Brom	Sunderland	Draw	1-1	West Brom	1-0
West Ham	Bolton	West Ham	2-0	Bolton	1-3
Wigan	Chelsea	Chelsea	0-2	Chelsea	0-6
Newcastle	Aston Villa	Newcastle	3-0	Newcastle	6-0
Fulham	Man Utd	Man Utd	0-2	Draw	2-2
Man City	Liverpool	Draw	1-1	Man City	3-0

Mark's winner prediction success rate: 4/10
Mark's score prediction success rate: 1/10

There have been four games in the Barclays Premier League so far ending in a 6-0 win: Chelsea have two, Arsenal and Newcastle have one each.
Mark Lawrenson, meanwhile, has a 40% winner prediction success rate overall, and a 10% score prediction success rate overall.

Next weekend: F1 is back with the Belgian Grand Prix from Spa! And there's another weekend of Premier League football.

Mark Lawrenson Premier League Prediction Results

Prediction vs Reality
Predictions here

Mark Lawrenson is a BBC football pundit who makes weekly predictions on the results of football matches, so he really ought to get these things right. Correct predictions are in bold.

Home Team	Away Team	Predicted winner	Predicted score	Actual winner	Actual score
Tottenham Hotspur	Manchester City	Spurs	2-1	Draw	0-0
Aston Villa	West Ham United	Villa	2-0	Villa	3-0
Blackburn Rovers	Everton	Draw	1-1	Blackburn	1-0
Bolton	Fulham	Bolton	2-1	Draw	0-0
Sunderland	Birmingham City	Sunderland	1-0	Draw	2-2
Wigan	Blackpool	Wigan	2-1	Blackpool	0-4
Wolverhampton	Stoke	Draw	1-1	Wolves	2-1
Chelsea	West Bromwich Albion	Chelsea	3-0	Chelsea	6-0
Liverpool	Arsenal	Draw	1-1	Draw	1-1
Manchester United	Newcastle	Man Utd	2-0	Man Utd	3-0

Mark's winner prediction success rate: 4/10
Mark's score prediction success rate: 1/10

My favourite football team in the whole world (Manchester United, are you surprised?) won their game 3 – 0, with a great performance from a long-time player Paul Scholes. Other teams who did well this weekend were Chelsea and Blackpool – who beat Wigan by a great margin and were the surprise win.
Mark Lawrenson so-far has a 10% score prediction success rate, and a 40% winner prediction success rate. While scores are hard to get right, I hope his winner predictions improve.
Next week: more Premier League football.

New Premier League Rules

Today the English (and Welsh) Premier League - one of the best football leagues in the world - kicks off. Naturally, I've been flicking through the handbook (PDF), inspired by an article in yesterday's Metro. It seems that a new rule is coming into effect this season to limit squad sizes.

Each team is limited to 25 over-21-year-old players, eight of which must be 'homegrown', although they are allowed more; that is, have been registered at an English or Welsh squad under the age of 21 for at least three years. The teams are also allowed an unlimited amount of under-21s.

I am not sure what happens if a squad has less than 25 over-21s available to them (for example Arsenal has only 22 over-21s, and Chelsea have 21). I believe that then they do not have to worry so much about the quota, but there is a limit of up to 17 foreign players (ie: who aren't 'homegrown'). So Chelsea, who only have five homegrown over-21s, are okay because they also only have 16 foreigners.

Probably a better way of wording the rule is: there are twenty-five squad places available. There is a limit of up to seventeen non-homegrown players on each squad, and under 21 players are not included in this count so a team can have as many as they like.

Manchester United are a big squad, with 43 players of which 15 are under 21s. There are fewer foreign players than Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal or Manchester City, and plenty of homegrown talent to choose from. However, some of the less-well-know homegrown players (they have 15 to choose from) may be lost.

Sources are: Metro, Premier League website.

English Premier League 2010/11 Season Preview

August 14th – this Saturday – is the first day of the English Premier League 2010/11 season. I have debated over it, and finally decided that I'll post on the football as well. [At the very least it will give me something to blog about over the winter when there's no Formula 1]
All twenty teams will be playing over the weekend, and I'll be covering various statistics. The usual ones should be:

• Average goals per game (over one weekend)
  
• Average cards per game (over one weekend)
  
• Top goalscorer (of the weekend)
  
• Total goals (whole season)
  
• Total yellow cards (whole season)
  
• Total red cards (whole season)

There are ten matches each weekend, but there will be no games when England are playing as so many teams will be losing key players across the world. Each team plays the other nineteen twice, so in total that will be 10*19*2 games or 380. Most matches take place on the Saturday, with a few on Sunday and (rarely) Monday.