I know there are no Swedish WNT players in Pride or Courage am I correct in assuming there are no Australian WNT players in them?
I estimated the performance ratings of 9 of 12 of the Olympic teams since January 1, 2020, based on the FIFA Ratings.It's a measure of how well a team has performed in the specific time period. Naturally it tends to hew close to the official ratings but performance ratings can sometime reveal upward or downward trends. USA performance rating 2196 (Official rating 2197) Netherlands 2029 (2035) Brazil 2010 (1971) China 1983 (1875) Canada 1960 (1962) Sweden 1939 (2011) Australia 1890 (1952) England 1854 (1974) * Japan 1842 (1942) *England of course is standing in for Team Great Britain The data of course is more sparse than it normally would because of the coronavirus pandemic which put a kibosh on games for almost a year. A team rated 100 points higher than another would be expected to advance in a knockout game roughly 62% of the time. With a 200 point difference, the higher-rated team's odds go up to roughly 74-75% 0 points difference: 50% odds of advancing in a knockout game 100 points: roughly 62% 200 points: roughly 74-75% 300 points: roughly 84% 400 points: roughly 91% 500 points: roughly 95%
I found a mistake in my calculation of Sweden's estimated performance rating. It should be 1957, not 1939. Not a huge difference but still, for some reason, I feel better. Also, I added the estimated performance ratings since 1/1/2020 for Chile and Zambia USA performance rating 2196 (Official rating 2197) Netherlands 2029 (2035) Brazil 2010 (1971) China 1983 (1875) Canada 1960 (1962) Sweden 1957 (2011) Australia 1890 (1952) England 1854 (1974) * Japan 1842 (1942) Chile 1626 (1622) Zambia 1352 (1191) New Zealand (official rating 1757) has not played a single match in 2020-2021 as far as I can find! I would simply ignore Zambia's rating; currently the greatest weakness of the FIFA rating system is the ranking of African teams. If you need a rating number for them, I would assign a provisional rating of 1600. Obviously that's a rough rough rough estimate. A team rated 100 points higher than another would be expected to advance in a knockout game roughly 62% of the time. With a 200 point difference, the higher-rated team's odds go up to roughly 74-75% 0 points difference: 50% odds of advancing in a knockout game 100 points: roughly 62% 200 points: roughly 74-75% 300 points: roughly 84% 400 points: roughly 91% 500 points: roughly 95%
Unacceptable. As a side note, does the Oly tournament not fall under FIFA's official tournaments? I thought that meant a call up couldn't be blocked unless injury. Am I missing something?
FIFA rules: "Monday morning of the week preceding the week when the relevant competition starts." Tournament starts 21st June so must release date is Monday morning 12th June. Technically speaking Courage and Pride didn't made any offence. However beacuse all teams traditionally play warm up games during a week before Olympic (or WWC) clubs are asked by associations to release NT players at the begining of said weekend (Friday or Saturday) rather than Monday. It's a fair play custom observed by all FA's ....or almost all as it would seem now. Its smells fishy because USSoccer is also main stakeholder in NWSL. NZL is in the group with USWNT. NZL problems play into USWNT advantage.
Yeah most FA have let their players go in camp early. Team GB have been in training since 17 June for example. Even earlier with the England players but they had to wait for Weir, Little and Ingle. It's a courtesy thing between clubs and country.
I think it speaks to how much those 2 players mean to their respective teams. I don't think there is a conspiracy between the NWSL clubs to help the USWNT win their game vs NZ. I mean, what are NZ's chances of beating the USA, even with all their players practicing together for the past month? Having said that, I agree that it was not acceptable to allow other players to be released by not those 2.
I cannot say anything about what might have motivated Orlando, but as for North Carolina, Riley has done this before. I do not think it has anything to do with helping the USWNT in the Olympics, I think it has to do with trying to get an advantage over a Courage opponent.
It seems odd though that Riley wouldn't want to keep his player happy. He's done that for Denise O'Sullivan and her place in Ireland's national team. Erceg had some kind of issue with her national team federation, if I recall, a year or two back (she may have even quite the team), so I wonder if Erceg feels as much loyalty to the NC Courage as to the New Zealand national team. I really don't know but I have to wonder.
That was my thought, but I was wondering if there was something I was unaware of. That and the timing of release.
COVID cases starting to show up apparently being caught in the Oly village.. One US women's gymnast. A couple of South African footballers. And there have been a few Oly staff/volunteers as well.
I wouldn't start thinking too negatively yet. As we saw from various sports competitions that were held during this pandemic, COVID cases will happen. No one thought there would be 0 infected during these olympics. As long as the athletes are tested frequently and the positive cases are caught, the games will go on. We can all worry if these numbers start reaching hundreds daily. Right now they are catching the 10 or so positive cases each day, searching close contancts, and getting them isolated which means we can relax and enjoy the sport. What has me more worried is the number of cases in Tokyo. But that will have minimal effect on the games. The bubble may be easy to break out of but is really hard to break into.
I am not sure I have actually seen a protocol for games postponed/cancelled due to Covid cases. I mean they can't postpone due to the tight schedule.
In terms of football, I heard the team with covid case(s) can play if the rest of the team tests negative within 6 hours before the game and the oppositiion are okay with it. Don't know how they decide which team forfeits the points though.
The Olympic Games have started with the softball match between Australia and Japan. Football is definitely a more interesting sport.
Just a question: isn't there any website or YouTube channel where all of the official highlights from this Olympic tournament will be uploaded, the way FIFA did with the World Cup? If yes, where? If no, why?
The Eurosport channel on Youtube has everything, but it might be geoblocked in certain areas. Let's try the USA-Sweden game as sample.
Thanks, it looks like it's not geo-blocked! The format looks like the short, limited one we're used to from FIFA events (for instance, I only watched the USA-Sweden highlights so far, but they're missing the post hit by USA at the end of 1st Half). It's way better than nothing for the matches I happened to miss, anyway. I wonder if they managed to squeeze in all of the 13 goals from Zambia-Netherlands: I suspect they didn't, but I'll give it a look later.
Trying to predict how Group E will end up. Who was the better team between Japan & Canada? Japan first, Canada second, GB third? Would make the quarterfinals as follows(with Brazil winning Group F): Japan vs. Australia Sweden vs. Great Britain Brazil vs. United States Netherlands vs. Canada
Highlights should be available from whatever broadcaster has the Olympic rights in your country. In the US, NBC Olympics' website has the highlights.
By the way: through Eurosport I could see highlights of USA-Sweden (that I had also watched live), Great Britain-Chile and Zambia-Netherlands. But I didn't notice any other highlights there so far. I watched Japan-Canada live so I don't need highlights, but could anyone post (here or on the respective threads) any video from Brazil-China and Australia-New Zealand, that I couldn't see so far?