AKA "Why I'm not going to lose a great deal of sleep until the hex" Having a bit of spare time for a change, I ambled on over to US Soccer.com to see what our records were against our own confederation. What I found was a bit interesting, to say the least... I've broken this down into two time frames..1900-1989 and 1990-present. 1990 is a pretty good benchmark since that was our first World Cup after 40 years in the soccer wilderness... Pre-1990 USA v CONCACAF - 31 wins, 43 losses, 20 draws (.436 winning percentage). Of those 43 losses, nearly half were at the hands (feet?) of El Tri, against whom the US was a putrid 2-20-3 through 1989. Other sides we played - and had a spot of trouble with - were Costa Rica (2-3-1), Canada (5-8-5), Haiti (4-6-3), and Guatemala (2-4-1). We had a few whipping boys ourselves during the dark ages - El Salvador (3-0-2), T&T (4-0-1), and of course, how can we forget Bermuda (5-1-0). The rest of the list: Jamaica 1-0-1, Honduras 1-0-1, Cuba 1-1-1, and the Netherlands Antilles 1-0-1. Ah, but what a difference in the last 14 years... 1990-2003 USA v CONCACAF - 59 wins, 17 losses, 25 draws (.708 winning percentage) Breakdown by nation (with our possible semi opponents bolded): Mexico 8-6-7 Costa Rica 8-6-3 Bermuda 1-1-0 T&T 6-1-2 Canada 5-0-3 Guatemala 5-0-2 Honduras 3-2-2 Jamaica 7-0-4 El Salvador 7-1-2 Panama 1-0-0 Cayman Islands 1-0-0 Cuba 3-0-0 Haiti 1-0-0 Barbados 2-0-0 Martinique 1-0-0 By my math, the record against our likely semi-final opponents since 1990 is 15-1-6 (.818)...yes, past performance is no guarantee, but history does mean something... Will the hex be harder...certainly. But even if you take the likely five (MEX, CRC, TNT, HON, JAM) the record is a decent 32-15-18 (.631). We play .600 soccer - which is exactly what we played in 2001 - we're going to Germany.
Good post, but your math is funny. 15 wins divided by 22 games played equals a winning percentage of .681. But I agree with what your post is saying. But you just never KNOW, that's why they play the games.
Re: Re: USA vs. CONCACAF - by the numbers I think it is your math that is funny. If you divide 15 by 22, you are effectively counting a draw as a loss. By convention, a draw is counted as 1/2 win, 1/2 loss. Then (15+3)/(1+3)=0.818
Nice post Bluecat82. Some nice statistical info. But I'll probably lose a little sleep even during friendlies.
Thanks for putting together this info. One point to remember is that an awful lot of these games were played on US soil. Our record in road WC qualifiers the last two cycles: Jamaica -- 2 draws El Salvador -- 1 draw Panama -- never played In the semis, we open with three of our first four games on the road, then we finish with two games at home. If we don't manage to steal a win on the road, we could still end up facing a must-win game or two.
Re: Re: Re: USA vs. CONCACAF - by the numbers A draw is not a win, so how can it be called a "winning" percentage? That is why in soccer the convention is to not report winning percentages. Because if anything a tie is only worth 1/3 of a win, so it should be counted as such. It's a meaningless stat, although I think it does give a general feeling how a team is playing.
I'm assuming you mean against those three sides...our overall road qualifying record the last two cycles is a very respectable 4-5-7 - the only place we haven't gotten any points is Saprissa.
IMO, that record is padded by some soft marks. Three of those wins came against weak opponents who had already been knocked out of contention before we beat 'em: Barbados, T&T, and Canada.
Re: Re: Re: Re: USA vs. CONCACAF - by the numbers That's why I think points percentage is a better metric than win percentage: (15*3+6*1)/(22*3)=51/66=0.773 In the end, it is points rather than wins that determines who goes to the WC and who goes home.