Catch - is that you?

[zigackly]

That doesn't actually disprove the 90% odd though does it.

 

I'm not saying it does though, I'm saying it disproves the addlebrained idea that any such correlation puts a ceiling on our finishing position!

 

Whether or not the stats have been collated and tested properly would strengthen or weaken the 90% or whatever it is today. My cynical position is to question whether they have been, which so far no-one has been prepared to answer.

 

Good post by the way.

[Catch22]

I'm not saying it does though, I'm saying it disproves the addlebrained idea that any such correlation puts a ceiling on our finishing position!

 

Whether or not the stats have been calculated and tested properly would strengthen or weaken the 90% or whatever it is today. My cynical position is to question whether they have been, which so far no-one has been prepared to answer.

 

The articles have all been peer-reviewed in reputable academic Journals.

The statistics are completely correct as to how much wage rank determines final positioning.

You can read the articles yourself & if you find anything wrong publish it.

 

The wage data comes from Companies House.

There is a very small possibility of fraudulent daa.

The League data is very easy to check.

 

The sample size is over 15 years (which means the sample is over 300 teams) & comes up with 88%.

 

Very recently he has done Italy as well.

That answer is apparently 93%.

However that article has yet to be peer-reviewed.

Italian accounting data is not as good as ours so there may be some fog around their wage data.

 

There is no serious doubt that wages cause approx 85-90% of final finishing position in the UK.

 

The probability you then put on team x finishing in position y can be worked out from that although you need to make some assumptions about underlying distribution.

 

In the Bosman era the PL title has only once gone to a team which wasn't in th top 2 rank (Arse in '04).

However that sample size is obviously 5% of the main 1 as there is only 1 winner each year, which is a bit too small to make direct claims from.

[zigackly]

Cheers for the answer Catch, in that case I can probably withdraw my questioning of the validity of the figures.

 

I don't withdraw my assertion that it doesn't mean we can't finish above our wage rank however, or even that it is unlikely. We do it more often than not.

 

Those people who say fifth is the best we can get based on these figures or even what we should usually expect are still incorrect and demonstrably so.

[Catch22]

Cheers for the answer Catch, in that case I can probably withdraw my questioning of the validity of the figures.

 

I don't withdraw my assertion that it means we can never finish above our wage rank however, or even that it is unlikely. We do it more often than not.

 

Yes ,a side can finish above its wage rank: that is partly down to luck but mainly to the manager,IMO.

 

The above rank is only true under Rafa though as he is such a good manager.

 

In the 5 years under GH we did a bit worse than should expected.

 

Over the last 10 years, our average is almost exactly in line.

[zigackly]

That is only true under Rafa as he is such a good manager.

 

No doubting he's good, but I think he could be better. The team which can regularly beat the top sides in Europe should be beating the dross in the premier league much more often.

[SiliconeSoul]

Yes ,a side can finish above its wage rank: that is partly down to luck.

 

Strange assertion given your faith in statistical outcome.

[Catch22]

No doubting he's good, but I think he could be better. The team which can regularly beat the top sides in Europe should be beating the dross in the premier league much more often.

 

 

I think the key issue has been brought up already by others in this thread: the quality of the football.

 

Arse have clearly decided that with their resources (& they spend more than us...) it makes more sense for the fans' enjoyment to concentrate on the quality of the play rather than maximising the chances of winning the PL.

 

Rafa has got very good results against expectations.

 

But he has done it with attritutional football.

 

Is that cost worth the gain?

That is a personal choice.

[zigackly]

Personally I strongly disagree that it's necessary to play attritional football against most of the teams in the league.

 

But I don't think Wenger's football is right either. He doesn't teach them how to defend.

[Paul]

I think the key issue has been brought up already by others in this thread: the quality of the football.

 

Arse have clearly decided that with their resources (& they spend more than us...) it makes more sense for the fans' enjoyment to concentrate on the quality of the play rather than maximising the chances of winning the PL.

 

Rafa has got very good results against expectations.

 

But he has done it with attritutional football.

 

Is that cost worth the gain?

That is a personal choice.

 

My problem with Rafa is that he has proved it doesn't have to be that way. And yet he then goes and undoes all his great work by (in my opinion) mis-managing players and needlessly changing the system. It's all ifs and buts and maybes, but I'm convinced we'd be heading towards the title if our squad was the same now as the one that we had going into the January window just over twelve months ago. He's his own worst enemy, in my view.

[SiliconeSoul]

I think the key issue has been brought up already by others in this thread: the quality of the football.

 

Arse have clearly decided that with their resources (& they spend more than us...) it makes more sense for the fans' enjoyment to concentrate on the quality of the play rather than maximising the chances of winning the PL.

 

Rafa has got very good results against expectations.

 

But he has done it with attritutional football.

 

Is that cost worth the gain?

That is a personal choice.

 

The enjoyment of football is slowly being sucked out of me with all this science and statistical data bobbins. Where's the romance in using wage bills to predict the league table before a ball has even been kicked? Status, ability, desire to win and good managment don't seem to matter anymore.

 

I get the impression this guy would have a different outlook with regards to wage bills if he wasn't a massive fan of Benitez. Talking about him being forced to go with more attritional football, when it's clear to most that he has a cautious, scientfic philosophy is fooling no one.

[Delmar]

I get the impression this guy would have a different outlook with regards to wage bills if he wasn't a massive fan of Benitez.

 

You are mixing things. The guy behind the statistical analysis is not the the same guy who wrote the article.

 

The stats provided give only the likelihood of something. Sure we can finish higher than what is likely, and equally, we can finish lower. But to think that we can finish season after season higher than what is likely (given that the correlation talked about is around 90%) is not very smart.

[zigackly]

If you take a correlation of just our wage bill against just our starting position in the last five years (so we're talking about Rafa's team), then surely it's not 90%? Or if the figures are calculated such that it is, then it's misleading to throw the 90% around as if it means we will finish in fifth nine years out of ten.

 

Why should we expect that to stop now that we've had one bad season?

[The Woolster]

I'm not saying it does though, I'm saying it disproves the addlebrained idea that any such correlation puts a ceiling on our finishing position!

 

Whether or not the stats have been collated and tested properly would strengthen or weaken the 90% or whatever it is today. My cynical position is to question whether they have been, which so far no-one has been prepared to answer.

 

Good post by the way.

 

5th definately isn't the best we can do, but I think it is fair to say that it is what we should expect if everything else is equal. But not everything is equal, we have a great manager, and that is why we often finish above expectations. This year he has not been as good, but a managers performance, like a players, can sometimes be above or below average.

 

I think it would actually be easier to understand if it was to calculate expected points instead of expected position. In very basic terms, you could say that a team with our wages should expect to score say, 75 points, which would explain 90% of our points scored. The other 10% would be 7.5 points, but this could be + or - from the 75 points, depending on whether the other factors were positive or negative for us. Giving a large swing of 15 points because the last 10% is very important.

 

The Fink Tank in The Times, do a manger of the year every season, which is based on expected points dependent on wages, and how many points the manager has added. I think it is pretty well explained. Fergie came top last season, with Rafa 2nd. Moyes has actually come top on a couple of occasions...

 

The graphic in the link shows all the managers

 

Sir Alex Ferguson is Fink Tank manager of the year | The Fink Tank - Times Online

 

Sir Alex Ferguson is Fink Tank manager of the year

 

They always ask the wrong question. When I tell people that I am about to reveal the Fink Tank Manager of the Year, I am usually asked “Who?” or sometimes “Why?” or most often “What are you serving for dinner and can I come?” But the right question is “How?”

 

I am going to tell you the identity of our Manager of the Year and you will have your own opinion of whether that feels right. But the correct way to judge if the result is correct is to judge whether the basis on which we made the calculation is correct. In other words, you need to think about how we did it, rather than who we picked. The result merely follows from our method of calculation.

 

So let me explain the thinking behind our method. First, we believe strongly that a calculation is better than a subjective judgment.

 

Subjective judgments based on newspaper reports or single incidents are inclined to give too much emphasis to individual events that happen to be at the front of people’s minds. This is what psychologists call the availability bias.

 

Second, you can’t use raw data on club performance to choose a manager of the year, because this ignores the elephant in the room. Money is the single most important driver of performance. You have to be able to model the relationship between the money spent and the team’s performance if you are going to isolate the impact of the manager.

 

Third, looking only at money, performance and expectations excludes many things that people might like to include. Press relations, say, or nimbleness in the transfer market. But our view is that these things don’t matter unless they impact on a team’s results. Who cares if someone is good in the transfer market unless they produce good results?

 

Finally, the period over which they produce good results is important.

 

Having a manager of the month is absurd, because the results of one month of games tell you almost as much about luck as they do about management.

 

There is a good argument that even a year is too short. But it is reasonable to take a look each season.

 

So, Dr Henry Stott, Dr Mark Latham and Dr Ian Graham began by plotting the number of points obtained by each club against their estimated player wage bill. This allowed a curve to be drawn that shows how many points you would expect a team to score given the amount of money they were spending. As you move towards the top end you have to spend more and more money to gain anything extra in the way of points. That is even more true this season than it was last season.

 

Finally, we excluded managers who had been in charge for fewer than 15 games because we didn’t think there was enough data to judge fully.

 

This year’s Manager of the Year is Sir Alex Ferguson, the first time he lifts the prestigious trophy. Even though Manchester United’s wage bill is vast, his performance exceeded the expected performance by a wide margin. Rafael Benítez came second, his best Fink Tank Manager of the Year performance. Tony Pulis and Phil Brown have also had exceptional seasons. David Moyes finished near the top again.

 

It is worth noting that Sam Allardyce did better than expected given the Blackburn Rovers wage bill despite not having a chance to play the transfer market properly.

 

Luiz Felipe Scolari finished in the bottom segment, though controversially above Gianfranco Zola. Guus Hiddink was excluded because he wasn’t manager for long enough. But if he had been included? He would have come second.

[Juan Galonso]

Whilst we may not be shopping in the bargain basement for every signing I think it's fair to say that there are restrictions on the players we are able to attract due to a lack of capital and competition from other clubs who can offer better terms.

 

I believe Tevez and particularly Barry would now be our players if it wasn't for new competition from Man City, for example.

 

It's also interesting that the only two major signings we made were structured deals from clubs allegedly owing us money from previous sales.

 

Why didn't Rafa take Tevez in the first place then back in 2006? Barry is a bullet dodged. Mr Average, always has been.

[The Woolster]

Strange assertion given your faith in statistical outcome.

 

Not really, models are very rarely 100% accurate, there is always a part that is unexplained. In football, a lot of this would be luck. Luck should even itself out, but this probably over a period a lot longer than a season. Which is part of why I think the term "the best team always wins the league" is a misnomer, as proved when Arsenal won the league in 89. But there are other examples as well.

[SiliconeSoul]

You are mixing things. The guy behind the statistical analysis is not the the same guy who wrote the article.

 

The stats provided give only the likelihood of something. Sure we can finish higher than what is likely, and equally, we can finish lower. But to think that we can finish season after season higher than what is likely (given that the correlation talked about is around 90%) is not very smart.

 

It's an interesting theory but 99.9 % bobbins. The margins for success between the top sides are so small that it's often ithe most basic of attributes that give one of them the edge.

 

I don't care what's written in some text book by an academic who's never been to a football match in his life. Wages are not the determining factor at the very top level, especially in the modern era. If you were talking about a mid-table side coming out of nowhere and winning the league, then yes. But not the likes of us who already have, or had, the status, squad and manager.

 

It used to be the more you spend the better the player = trophies. Now it's the squad or the wage bill. Just excuse after excuse.

[SiliconeSoul]

Not really, models are very rarely 100% accurate, there is always a part that is unexplained. In football, a lot of this would be luck. Luck should even itself out, but this probably over a period a lot longer than a season. Which is part of why I think the term "the best team always wins the league" is a misnomer, as proved when Arsenal won the league in 89. But there are other examples as well.

 

I didn't think 'luck' was even acknowledged in scientifc research?

[The Woolster]

The enjoyment of football is slowly being sucked out of me with all this science and statistical data bobbins. Where's the romance in using wage bills to predict the league table before a ball has even been kicked? Status, ability, desire to win and good managment don't seem to matter anymore.

.

 

But they do matter, they matter imensly, its those things can't easily be measured with a number, and part of them will acutally be reflected in the wage numbers, which is why it comes out at such a high number.

 

But if it gets you down, just ignore it and watch the game, as it isn't about stats, its just some of us saddos are more statistically inclined.

[The Woolster]

I didn't think 'luck' was even acknowledged in scientifc research?

 

Luck is a huge part of scientific/mathmatical research. It will often be called randomness, which is in effect just luck, and explains evolution, changes in stock markets, how a large group of people will react to something like a fire in a building etc

[zigackly]

Woolster or Catch, do you happen to know what the standard deviation is in these stats?

[Delmar]

It's an interesting theory but 99.9 % bobbins. The margins for success between the top sides are so small that it's often ithe most basic of attributes that give one of them the edge.

 

I don't care what's written in some text book by an academic who's never been to a football match in his life. Wages are not the determining factor at the very top level, especially in the modern era. If you were talking about a mid-table side coming out of nowhere and winning the league, then yes. But not the likes of us who already have, or had, the status, squad and manager.

 

It used to be the more you spend the better the player = trophies. Now it's the squad or the wage bill. Just excuse after excuse.

 

Believe what you wish, you can think that the earth is flat for all that I care, after all you cannot see the curvature and it's only the academics who say that we live on this round thingy. Or you can take e.g. the casinos, they care a bit about the academics who figured the odds, and how they work in their favor. In the long term they win.

 

The whole theory about wages is simply a question of likelihoods, not a guarantee of something, not a final say. You should look at it that way, as a tool to put things in perspective.

[SiliconeSoul]

I already acknowledge wages' as a big part of the game. I just refuse to believe that you can use them to work out a fixed percentage on success. It's sport not science and there are too many humans getting in the way, and other variables. For me it just feels like another excuse to hide behind, but maybe I'm out of touch.

[redrosetints]

Exactly. If it wasn't so bleedin' obvious that we've been playing utterly sterile and inept shite this season then it'd be easier to accept the supposed limitations of our place in the wages league table.

 

Although, if we had the money to pay more wages, we'd perhaps have had a better squad to ope with all the injuries this year. Tevez and Barry could be reds, but this last summer, both went for double the wages we could have offered.

[Hermes]

Christ on a bike!!! I only posted this for a laugh. I never seriously expected the debate to be done again. Now it has started though, I'll add my tuppence ha'penny.

 

 

You do realise some posters in this thread have a much bigger budget than you?

 

Therefore they have a 90% chance of their post being read before yours, or is it 93%?

[Guest PurpleNose]

.

 

Those people who say fifth is the best we can get based on these figures or even what we should usually expect are still incorrect and demonstrably so.

 

I don't think anyone is saying fifth is the best we can get.

 

Just that, if we finish 5th, its only a failure because of who we are. Because we're a fucking massive club. Because we expect better. We expect trophies.

 

If we hadn't been the best team in the world 25/30 years ago no-one would write article after article about us being in crisis, massively underachieving etc

Our own fans wouldn't see us as underachieving either.

 

There is nothing tangible that says we should be winning trophies, and challenging for the title.

 

Which is why, for me, my main problem is the style of football. I know we've got fuck all money, but we've got some decent players. Capable of playing much better than they are.

 

I also think we can exceed expectations because more so than any other league transfer fees and wages paid often do not reflect the quality of player. More shite signings, and inflated wages, are paid in the Premier League than anywhere else.

 

Newcastle were mentioned yesterday, they're a good example of average players being paid massive wages.

 

I would imagine Fulham are currently overachieving by a decent margin.

 

Whilst I have no reason to doubt the percentage for correlation between wages and league position it doesn't mean the 93% has to apply to each team. We have great fans, a good manager, and a few genuinely world class players who are much better than whatever their wage is (few worse mind). All of which mean we can exceed our expectations.