Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Modelling association football scores

1982; Wiley; Volume: 36; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1111/j.1467-9574.1982.tb00782.x

1467-9574

Mike Maher,

Sports Performance and Training

Abstract Previous authors have rejected the Poisson model for association football scores in favour of the Negative Binomial. This paper, however, investigates the Poisson model further. Parameters representing the teams' inherent attacking and defensive strengths are incorporated and the most appropriate model is found from a hierarchy of models. Observed and expected frequencies of scores are compared and goodness‐of‐fit tests show that although there are some small systematic differences, an independent Poisson model gives a reasonably accurate description of football scores. Improvements can be achieved by the use of a bivariate Poisson model with a correlation between scores of 0.2.