kenntomasch
29 Oct 2003, 11:52 PM
MLS, as many of you know, is trying (more or less) the traditional two-legged playoff system this year for the first time. This has led to much debate about who truly has the advantage in a two-legged scenario, whether you'd rather have the first game at home or the second game at home.
A few years ago, I studied the Champions League and UEFA Cup competitions and found that whether a team hosted the first or second leg made virtually no difference to their chances of advancing in the tournament. I don't have those numbers on me as I type this, but it was so close to .500 either way, it was scary.
Now that the A-League has had two legs in its playoffs for a few years, I re-ran the numbers and found that, in this very limited sample at least, there was a good-sized advantage to having the second game at home.
The A-League went to two legs in its conference semifinals and conference finals in 2000, then went to two legs for its entire playoffs (except the one-off Final) in 2001. So we're looking at four years worth of data (which isn't much, admittedly).
Anyway, there have been 32 two-legged ties in that period. The Game 1 host has advanced 12 times out of 32 (37.5%). The Game 2 host has advanced 20 times out of 32 (62.5%).
This despite the fact the W-L-T percentages of home teams in either leg were fairly consistent (16-8-8 for First Leg home teams, 15-10-7 for Second Leg home teams).
I believe (someone check me if I'm wrong), that in the A-League, the higher seed has the choice of hosting the first or second leg, while in MLS, the higher seed automatically gets the second leg. This could skew the results a bit, I would think.
It may be that when you have two teams that haven't been "seeded" by virtue of having played a season's worth of games against basically the same opposition, and where you presume that they're closely matched by virtue of the fact that they both won their way into a very difficult competition (in the case of the CL or the UEFA Cup), that the two-legged tie reduces the impact of the advantage of hosting one leg versus the other.
It may be that in a closed league, where one team has proven over the course of a season that it's superior to its opponent (because you usually see a highly-seeded team take on a low-seeded team, like a 1-4 or 1-8 scenario), that the quality team will win out more often than not, and therefore the advantage does lie with the team hosting one leg versus hosting the other (and by this very limited sample, it appears the leg to have is the second one).
I have heard of (but not seen - I believe Phil had it) a study conducted that encompassed many years worth of results in Europe that showed a definite advantage to hosting the second leg. That would be more credible than my original analysis of a year's worth of CL and UEFA Cup results (as well as this limited study), as long as the unseen study didn't use results from before the War or something. If they're recent results, the more data, the better.
So right now I'm leaning towards believing that there's some sort of advantage (maybe it's largely psychological) in having the second leg at your place. MLS obviously thinks there's an advantage, giving the higher-seeded teams the second leg this time. That doesn't mean there can't be or won't be upsets, but it looks as though history is with the Fire, the Revs, the Quakes and the Wizards in the first round.
The numbers:
2000
(6 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 3 times
Game 2 host went through 3 times
Higher seed won 4 of the 6 ties
2001
(10 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 4 times
Game 2 host went through 6 times
Higher seed won 7 of the 10 ties
2002
(10 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 3 times
Game 2 host went through 7 times
Higher seed won 5 of the 10 ties
2003
(6 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 2 times
Game 2 host went through 4 times
Higher seed won 4 of the 6 ties
Total
(32 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 12 times
Game 2 host went through 20 times
Higher seed won 20 of the 32 ties
A few years ago, I studied the Champions League and UEFA Cup competitions and found that whether a team hosted the first or second leg made virtually no difference to their chances of advancing in the tournament. I don't have those numbers on me as I type this, but it was so close to .500 either way, it was scary.
Now that the A-League has had two legs in its playoffs for a few years, I re-ran the numbers and found that, in this very limited sample at least, there was a good-sized advantage to having the second game at home.
The A-League went to two legs in its conference semifinals and conference finals in 2000, then went to two legs for its entire playoffs (except the one-off Final) in 2001. So we're looking at four years worth of data (which isn't much, admittedly).
Anyway, there have been 32 two-legged ties in that period. The Game 1 host has advanced 12 times out of 32 (37.5%). The Game 2 host has advanced 20 times out of 32 (62.5%).
This despite the fact the W-L-T percentages of home teams in either leg were fairly consistent (16-8-8 for First Leg home teams, 15-10-7 for Second Leg home teams).
I believe (someone check me if I'm wrong), that in the A-League, the higher seed has the choice of hosting the first or second leg, while in MLS, the higher seed automatically gets the second leg. This could skew the results a bit, I would think.
It may be that when you have two teams that haven't been "seeded" by virtue of having played a season's worth of games against basically the same opposition, and where you presume that they're closely matched by virtue of the fact that they both won their way into a very difficult competition (in the case of the CL or the UEFA Cup), that the two-legged tie reduces the impact of the advantage of hosting one leg versus the other.
It may be that in a closed league, where one team has proven over the course of a season that it's superior to its opponent (because you usually see a highly-seeded team take on a low-seeded team, like a 1-4 or 1-8 scenario), that the quality team will win out more often than not, and therefore the advantage does lie with the team hosting one leg versus hosting the other (and by this very limited sample, it appears the leg to have is the second one).
I have heard of (but not seen - I believe Phil had it) a study conducted that encompassed many years worth of results in Europe that showed a definite advantage to hosting the second leg. That would be more credible than my original analysis of a year's worth of CL and UEFA Cup results (as well as this limited study), as long as the unseen study didn't use results from before the War or something. If they're recent results, the more data, the better.
So right now I'm leaning towards believing that there's some sort of advantage (maybe it's largely psychological) in having the second leg at your place. MLS obviously thinks there's an advantage, giving the higher-seeded teams the second leg this time. That doesn't mean there can't be or won't be upsets, but it looks as though history is with the Fire, the Revs, the Quakes and the Wizards in the first round.
The numbers:
2000
(6 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 3 times
Game 2 host went through 3 times
Higher seed won 4 of the 6 ties
2001
(10 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 4 times
Game 2 host went through 6 times
Higher seed won 7 of the 10 ties
2002
(10 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 3 times
Game 2 host went through 7 times
Higher seed won 5 of the 10 ties
2003
(6 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 2 times
Game 2 host went through 4 times
Higher seed won 4 of the 6 ties
Total
(32 two-legged ties)
Game 1 host went through 12 times
Game 2 host went through 20 times
Higher seed won 20 of the 32 ties