It seems the financial analysis gurus(?) have come to the soccer World Cup party, with a few mathematically modelled predictions for the winner of next month’s world cup here in South Africa.
“JPMorgan, which described the report as “an opportunity to lightheartedly explain quantitative techniques,” applied a mathematical model, built to screen and identify stocks, to soccer. It used data including bookmakers’ odds, official FIFA world rankings, previous results and the match schedule to predict a winner.”
If they’re right, then we really did not need to spend ridiculous sums of money on infrastructure and stadiums, did we?
Let’s hope this maths hasn’t taken all the unpredictability out of the sport.