Posted by Brad @ 5:55 pm on November 13th 2009

The Soccer Power Index

Nate Silver, in coordination with ESPN, devises a new predictive ranking system for national soccer teams to begin the countdown to the 2010 World Cup.

You can view it here.

Eat it, Mexico.

posted in: Main

6 Comments »

  1. A more accurate gauge of actual soccer power than the FIFA rankings, certainly.

    The US has shaped up into a really unpredictable team, even by soccer standards. I don’t think they’re even the fourteenth-most-likely team to win the World Cup, because that would require them to play four consecutive good games during the knockout stage. But if you’re looking for a team to beat, say, Brazil or Spain in a one-off match…well, I would ABSOLUTELY say that the US is one of the five most likely teams in the world to pull that off.

    Remember that as catastrophically bad as the last WC was for the US, we were STILL the only team in the tournament to hold the eventual world champs to a regulation draw. And we did that a man down for sixty minutes with a shorthanded goal called back.

    Comment by Rojas — 11/13/2009 @ 10:01 pm

  2. You’ve totally turned me into a fair weather soccer fan. Not a real fan, mind, but a fair weather one.

    In any case, the methodology of this is pretty fascinating although, like all statistical models of this sort, it’s only as good as its premises.

    In any case, besides the one Silver mentions in his post I linked first (Uruguay, Chile, etc.), the teams that are ranked very differently are England (7 in FIFA, 3 in SPI), Italy (4 in FIFA, 12 in SPI), Croatia (8 in FIFA, 19 in SPI), Sweden (41 in FIFA (!), 23 in SPI), and Switzerland (13 in FIFA, 33 in SPI).

    When did the Dutch get so good?

    Comment by Brad — 11/14/2009 @ 12:00 am

  3. The Dutch have been a global soccer power since the 1970s, and are probably the greatest soccer nation to have never won a World Cup.

    Comment by Rojas — 11/14/2009 @ 12:50 am

  4. I know they’re good, but I only vaguely remember them from 98, don’t remember them being a factor in the last two world cups at all, or the few international tourneys I’ve watched. Which is again not saying much. Fair weather.

    Comment by Brad — 11/14/2009 @ 12:59 am

  5. In 74 and 78, the Dutch were awesome and doing it playing beautiful football. But they’re always pretty good.

    Comment by Adam — 11/14/2009 @ 12:50 pm

  6. The Dutch are basically the St. Louis Cardinals of international soccer. Everyone acknowledges that they have the talent to win it, but they’re nobody’s first pick, and everyone also knows that the stars have to align right for it to happen.

    The thing about the World Cup is the phenomenally small sample size of the event–once every four years means that a few elementary twists of fate can prevent a truly extraordinary team from ever sniffing the cup. The Hungarians of the 1950s were almost certainly the world’s best team, but never struck gold. Ditto the Dutch of the 1970s. France had to wait a long time to get over the hump. The USSR was a perennial power and never really got a sniff. The Swedes were also very good for a very long time.

    Comment by Rojas — 11/15/2009 @ 12:39 am

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