FoG

Ballon d'Or Connections Game Check Selection New Puzzle more links | credits: ChatGPT

Who Is Your Ballon d'Or Spirit Country? Pick your 5 players based on the criteria below for the period 1st Aug 2023 to 31st Jul 2024 to elect your own Ballon D'Or contender. 1) Individual performances, decisive and impressive character 2) Team performances and achievements 3) Class and fair play You will be matched with the Ballon D'Or Journalist who voted closest to your vote. Submit Reset

The Paradox: In this thought experiment, Achilles, a swift warrior, is racing against a slow-moving tortoise. To make it fair, the tortoise is given a head start. The paradox argues that Achilles can never overtake the tortoise, no matter how fast he runs. Here’s how the paradox is laid out: Initial Position : The tortoise starts ahead of Achilles. Achilles Moves to the Tortoise's Initial Position : By the time Achilles reaches the point where the tortoise started, the tortoise has moved forward a small distance. Achilles Moves to the Tortoise's New Position : Achilles then moves to the new position of the tortoise, but by the time he gets there, the tortoise has moved even further ahead. Repetition : This process continues indefinitely, with Achilles always reaching where the tortoise was, but the tortoise always being a little bit ahead. The paradox suggests that Achilles will never be able to overtake the tortoise because there are infinitely many points he must reach where

The Ballon D'Or has been presented since 1956, there have been numerous changes in the voting process in that time.  So much so that much of the old data is irrelevant.  We will look mostly at recent years - namely the last 10 awards (2013-2023). Even in that time there are changes in the voting process.  2013: It was Media, Captains and Coaches voted for the best player in the world (and it had been this way since 2010). 2016: it reverted to Media (journalists) only, one representing every country in the world. 2022: it was further restricted to journalist one representing the top 100 FIFA ranked nations. Also in 2022 there was changes in the criteria.  Before 2022 the players overall career was also a consideration, in 2022 it was explicitly just based on current season. How have these changes effected results. Media opinion vs Captains/Coaches. We have the breakdown of votes for the period for when both Media (Journos) and Captain/Coaches voted. Ballon D'Or Vote breakdowns b

With England, there is always alot of discussion about Gareth Southgate. But how much do managers really matter anyway.  According to this article the answer is "not much" and even goes as far as to present a theory that managers are mere scapegoats for the board and owners.  Protects them from any real criticism when they can just sack/blame the manager. I also think that a managers influence is becoming smaller and smaller over the years as modern football clubs have directors of football, data analytics departments and other teams of people that they lean on for support.  Its not all the managers decision as much as the Alex Ferguson days. Furthermore for an International manager, he doesn't have a say in player development (he sees them 3 or 4 times per year only on international break).  He can't transfer players, he has to accept the players that he has.  So in both those aspects he has alot less control, a lot less influence. That is not to say that the FA sho

For the  Sophisticated Predictions Contest for Euro 2024  I have had an attempt to build a prediction. There is information in bookie odds and often the most accurate probability of a match result between two teams is in the Closing Match odds at time of kick off.  At least if you know a better prediction you will be rich.  But for the rest of us non-professional bettors and even most professional bettors the closing line will be the best prediction for the probability of a football match that you can get. Given the probability we can easily deconstruct the relative ratings of the teams.  On a basic level the favourite is better team than the underdog - and the shorter their odds the bigger the gap in the ratings. So I have a basic ELO-like system, but it is based on the closing match odds rather than the result.  Using odds over result I think the ratings converge on something more realistic and do it much quicker.   For example England played Germany in the Nations League.  My rating