Sunday’s matches weren’t supposed to happen. None of the four teams playing was given even a 50 percent chance of reaching the knockout stage by ESPN’s Soccer Power Index-backed model at the start of the tournament. Now two will reach the quarterfinal and one will play a semifinal. --Fivethirtyeight.com.
It's not difficult to explain why Nate Silver's World Cup forecasts are far less impressive than his election forecasts. As Silver notes before the competition got under way, the World Cup is a data poor environment: the world's top national football sides play each other extremely rarely when the outcome really matters. In such environments forecasting requires really good background-theory, which is lacking. Moreover, Silver's player-centred algorithm misses two key factors this year: quality of coaching and fitness, which have been decisive in the blistering tropical heat. Let's take for example, the Netherlands Vs Mexico.
During their debacle at Euro 2012, where the Dutch (still reigning vice-champions of the World) got outplayed in three group games, it was evident that the Dutch team was out of shape. This is not the case this year: in all four games (against Spain, Australia, Chile, and Mexico) the Dutch were the fitter side. In each game, they dominated the last thirty minutes of the game. They also tend to dominate the last few minutes of the first half, where they have had a lot of scoring opportunities.* Similar fitness-differentials were apparent in the hard-fought round of sicteen defeats of Nigeria by France and the loss of Algeria to Germany.
Sometimes some such apparent fitness superiority is a consequence of being the better technical side; the team that can maintain passing possession of the ball controls tempo and has more efficient runs on the field. (You try chasing a ball for ninety minutes.) But Nigeria is not inferior in technique to France; arguably, this year's Mexican side was technically superior to the Dutch side in ball control ability. But in addition to being physically unprepared, the Mexicans (and a day later the Nigerians) got outcoached down the stretch. (Zonalmarking has a terrific analysis.) Sure, at this level of competition one also needs luck; Chilean will always ask, what if Pinilla's strike? (Just ask Dutch folk of a certain age about Rensenbrink.)
In fact, Herrera's coaching flaws were also apparent in the group game against Brazil. With the Brazilians on the rope (the game was tied at 0-0 thanks to the brilliance of goallie Ochoa), Miguel Herrera, a mediastar now, visibly instructed his players to calm down, play for possession, and not go for the game-winner. In this way, they denied themselves a shot at victory in the group, and the psychological boost of defeating the pre-tournament favorite on home ground.
Tournament football is tricky; you don't want to peak too early--it's the last four games that matter most, of course. But it's also crucial that teams believe in their chances; Silver's algorithm told him that the Spanish team were near favorites (and undoubtedly the same algorithm did not predict the French collapsed in 2010). But Spanish invincibility had already been shattered. (Pick your moment: Bayern Munich against Barcelona in 2013 or the national side's defeat against Brazil in 2013.) It probably would have happened already in 2012, but a talented French side didn't trust its own abilities in Donetsk and did't show up to win.
To put it bluntly: due to his substitutions, Herrera's side tried to sit on a lucky lead for a third of the game;** rather than putting the Dutch away. At the highest level one generally is made to pay for such strategic blunders. So, what Silver really needs is a measure or proxy of coaching quality that given a baseline quality of players, shows a coach's capacity to improve a team's winning chances.
*This was a hall-mark of all the winning German teams between 1974-1996.
**After the game Herrera whined about the refereeing; this is odd. Because (a) nobody denies that Holland equalized fairly (so absent the Huntelaar penalty, the game would have gone into overtime; the Mexicans were spent while the Dutch looked fit); and (b) while the penalty that was awarded was an arguable case (Robben dived after having been touched), the penalty that the Dutch were denied earlier was close to a refereeing blunder.
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