From the Round of 16 to the Title

Okay fair enough, I view Belgium the same way, I think the lack of experience will catchup to them much like Portugal of 2002. I just think placing teams in tiers can be very tricky. If both Russia and Slovenia are considered tier 2, I can tell you there is a big difference between them. I get what your saying overall, but with so many variables this can never move past hypothesis into theory.

 

Well, not to beat a dead horse, but there are just so few recent competitive matches against 2nd tiers it's hard to believe the results show anything meaningful at all. Japan has played five matches against 2nd tiers (three of them 12 years ago at home at WC 2002), South Korea has played four (2 of them 12 years ago at home at WC 2002), and Iran two (both 12 years ago). So out of the 11 competitive matches, 7 were over 10 years ago. All you have since then is Japan's draw with Croatia in 2006, South Korea's loss to Switzerland in 2006 (you listed that as a draw, BTW), and the Japan and ROK wins in 2010. Really, those two 2010 wins are the "foundation" for this entire house of cards of yours.

You also don't include the Saudi Arabia, China and North Korea results. Yes, I know they didn't qualify this time, but they did during your selected time frame, and were apparently the best AFC had to offer for their World Cup years. There is no justification for excluding them that I can see, other than their poor results undermine the argument you're trying to make.

 

Sample size is one of those devily little buggers that renders virtually any cross confederation analysis meaningless. There simply aren't anywhere near enough games.

The best you can do is note changing patterns, like Mexico suddenly producing quality results every single cup starting in '86, or S. Korea and Japan starting in '02, or USA starting in '94, and yet still, the sample size is way too small.

I do think its reasonable, however, to argue that the power of Europe's second tier, does not appear to be as widely and deeply ensconced over the rest of the world (minus Conmebol), as it once did. The relative scale of that change is impossilbe to reliably evaluate with so few cups, and disagreement over the value of competitions like the olympics and the youth world cups.

We'll see how things go this time around, a third straight tourney with a dip in UEFA performance? or something more like '06? I suspect we'll see a stronger UEFA performance, but Conmebol reigning supreme. Too many of the strongest world teams have miserable draws (Ghana, USA), or difficult draws for the knockout rounds (Ghana, USA, Mexico) etc (could write more but the bells gonna ring).

 

2009 Kirin Cup tie 'Japan - Belgium' ... Belgium called upon players that would never be considered in competitive matches. In the first XI only Vermaelen & Alderweireld could be considered ... still Vermaelen (in his early 20s and still playing in the Dutch league, not Arsenal) and Alderweireld (a teenage academy player, debutant for NT and club). Say what you like ... the Kirin Cup line-up wasn't exactly Belgium's best (even 2nd & 3rd stringers declined while nobody was motivated).

The XI that reached the semi-finals at the Olympics 1 year earlier consisted of 8-9 players that most likely will feature in the Brazil2014 squad ... the likes of Kompany, Vertonghen, Vermaelen, Dembele, Fellaini, Mirallas, et al. ... unlike in the Kirin Cup, the players wanted to go to the Olympics and win matches. Imho you need to look at qualitative analysis methods ... at least to explain why teams are getting good/bad results.

 

I don't think anyone (except you) ever left step 1, because no reason has been established to do so. Your initial idea to examine if there is a correlation between friendly results and competitive results was an interesting one, but you abandoned that for this mismash of friendlys and World Cup results, 2nd tier results, third tier results, inclusion of some AFC teams, exclusion of others, that your model has ended up looking like the cyber equivalent of swiss cheese.

 

Line ups don't make a team 1st-tier... results do.

 

That is a bold prediction! (/sarc off /pun intended)

 

In other words: we don't get that model at all! And thus it is useless.

 

I think they could trip up slightly early (I rate them as a top 10 side, but think they'll struggle to get past the R16's because of the group pairing with G), but with their group draw, I don't see how its possible they fail to advance from the group. Russia doesn't scare anyone, they aren't bad, but they aren't consistent, and they aren't anything special. South Korea's solid, and usually maxes out potential in tourney's but it sounds like this is a weak version for them, and lastly Algeria, literally the best possible scenario out of the CAF/Conmebol+1 draw. They would have to be just unbelievably bad to crash out early against those foes. At bare minimum they should be able to pull out at least 4-5 points and a quality GD that should trump at least Algeria's and South Korea's, more likely is a 6, 7 or 9 point pull (I'm picturing 7 or 9, and would bet on 9).

That R16 match could be trouble though, Portugal, or Ghana most likely, both would be extremely difficult outs, Germany possibly but highly unlikely (Germany almost never fumbles a first place group finish away), the USA looked totally out of sorts against them in friendlies at home, not exactly a good sign though I don't take friendlies all that seriously (still, getting rolled 4-1, until a late penalty gave the scoreline a slightly less embarrasing look, suggests a complete and thorough arse kicking would be in the offing if the US took second and Belgium first in June), with Argentina in the quarterfinals, I would assumed they'd be home at that point if they survive the R16's.

So yes, in a sense I also see Belgium failing to live up to the rep at the tourney, but it's got a lot more to do with the unbelievable difficulty of getting to the semi's considering their path, the only more difficult path outside of group play for a team is probably if your runner up in either group A or B or G.

 

friendlies are utterly b.s. that's why.

For gosh sakes, if I believe friendlies are relevant at all, I should assume the US is going to beat the piss out of Germany in June in that final group game, especially if they are resting carded players, and our only likely carded players are two left feet having hacks that we wouldn't miss anyway. We did jump out to a 4-1 lead after all.

Why can't we beat Portugal? We did before. We beat Italy in Italy in '12, we drew Russia in Russia in '12, we beat Bosnia in Bosnia in '13, Portugal shouldn't be too much trouble right.

Except of course all those results don't mean squat.

Germany is likely to beat us handily, or simply salt away a 1-0 lead. Ditto Portugal.

If sample size is a problem, and it fundamentally is, the fact that friendlies are in any way a part of any of this is just patently ridiculous.

Germany brought a bunch of B and C siders last summer, only a handful of players we might see. Ghana doesn't care about friendlies and so generates bizarre results. Portugal doesn't even care about qualifiers half the time because they're so sure of themselves.

The friendly thing is irrelevant, and there's nothing remotely remarkable about it.

Some things you just can't reliably argue about statistically and one of them is cross confederation comparisons.

We can do it with club teams, but with international sides there's nowhere near as reliable a means of sampling.

Want the penultimate example?

May 2012: USA 5 Scotland 1

November 2013: Scotland 0 USA 0

In one game the US played Scotland off the field, and made them look like a collection of 3rd graders who thought they were showing up to play rugby instead. In the latter match, it was a stultifying, grind fest, devoid of creative play (our best playmaking midfielders were all unavailable), and featuring a Scottish team that wasn't going to embarrass themselves at home. Their attitude 18 months earlier? They were on holiday, and just had to keep a window open for training and a game late one night.

Friendlies are meaningless in terms of results.

There value is inherently in testing out players in new formations or positions, blooding new players, testing out differing approaches, and ramping up for major tournaments by getting a relatively serious scrimmage.

They really should be called scrimmages instead at this point but I guess it's difficult to charge a small fortune for a glorified scrimmage.

 

Yes sir, permission to use the wash-room captain?

 

I agree with you, the group and path a team is placed in, is without a doubt the biggest challenge for most every team. I think to over come that you need talent, which they clearly have, and experience, which is what this team is lacking, average age I believe is 25.5 and more so the fact this is their first major tourney.

That is why I believe the Belgium for euro 16 will be deadly.

 

Are you predicting that Belgium won't survive the group stage? This thread is called 'From the Round of 16 to the Title' ... I'm unsure what all the group matches have to do with it. Imho Belgium is expected to reach the R16 and anything less is a failed campaign. From R16 it will be a rough path ... most likely it ends either in the R16 or the QFs.

 

I'll be happy to do all 8 teams in two of the Brazil groups if we can come up with a model that makes sense. However, I'm not sure we can overcome the fact that there are rarely enough competitive matches in a two or even four year cycle to provide enough results to compare with the results in the friendlys. And even if there are, how do we quantify it?