JP Morgan Quants Predict World Cup Win 2010 for England

[Andy Nguyen]

With the 2010 World Cup kicking off in less than four weeks, financial analysts at JP Morgan have crunched the numbers and come up with a bold conclusion – England will win football's biggest prize for the first time in 44 years.

Matthew Burgess and Marco Dion made the claim this morning, as an illustration of how 'Quant methodology' (the use of mathematical data to evaluate investment opportunities) can be applied to the real world.

Burgess and Dion took mathematical models created to assess stocks, and instead plugged in data on Fifa rankings, historical football results, and the latest bookmakers' odds. And despite concern over the state of Wayne Rooney's groin, Ledley King's knee and Gareth Barry's ankle, the pair predicted in a note to City investors that the Three Lions would maul Spain in the final on 11 July, with Holland coming third.

"Having developed a rather successful Quant Model over the years, we intend to introduce it to our readers and also use its methodology to apply it to a fruitful field for statistics: Football and the World Cup," they wrote.

JP Morgan added that they believe Brazil to be the strongest team taking part in the tournament. However, due to the fixture schedule, their model predicts overall victory for England – who will play Algeria, Slovenia and the USA in the group stages of the tournament.

Based on today's odds at Betfair, England are third favourite to lift the trophy, with Spain the punters' top pick ahead of Brazil.

Burgess and Dion also admitted that their work should be taken "with a pinch of salt", but insisted that the upcoming World Cup was "an ideal opportunity to light-heartedly explain quantitative techniques and demystify the typical Quant framework."

Given that Quant methodology is used widely in the City, there could be red faces at JP Morgan (and a few concerned investors) if England should crash out of the tournament on 23 June in a shock defeat to Slovenia.

<object id="doc_792588131835481" name="doc_792588131835481" height="600" width="800" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" data="http://d1.scribdassets.com/ScribdViewer.swf" style="outline:none;" > <param name="movie" value="http://d1.scribdassets.com/ScribdViewer.swf"> <param name="wmode" value="opaque"> <param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff"> <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"> <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"> <param name="FlashVars" value="document_id=31538511&access_key=key-i45j8lq2okvsh0vj9i1&page=1&viewMode=list"> <embed id="doc_792588131835481" name="doc_792588131835481" src="http://d1.scribdassets.com/ScribdViewer.swf?document_id=31538511&access_key=key-i45j8lq2okvsh0vj9i1&page=1&viewMode=list" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="600" width="800" wmode="opaque" bgcolor="#ffffff"></embed> </object>

 

[helpteye]

England will not pass semifinals; neither will Netherlands

 

[alain]

do you mean they are going to make the semifinals and that's it? or they are not even making the semifinal?

 

[Stefan Zota]

Such analysis was done at previous cups as well. It's not relevant since football is not statistics.

England is a strong team, especially considering their manager. However there are core problems which will stop them short:
- Rooney, best forward is injured
- main players are hard to recoup after a long season
- several conflicts between players, exploited by the media
- temperature and weather in general doesn't help
- easy qualifying group, they haven't faced a real test in last year

Brazil is the big favorite, really hard to name a contender. Personally I would pick Germany ...

 

[helpteye]

it depends on who they play in Round of 16; if Germany, then no quarterfinal; if Ghana, then maybe quarterfinal but not semifinal. There are some great teams out there. Germany will not have Ballack so they could underperform this time around for he is a true leader.Do not count out France, they always over-perform like in 06 when they were the oldest team. No African team wil win but Ghana may make quaters if they meet USA in R16.
Argentina is the Elephant in the room.

 

[Stefan Zota]

it depends on who they play in Round of 16; if Germany, then no quarterfinal; if Ghana, then maybe quarterfinal but not semifinal. There are some great teams out there. Germany will not have Ballack so they could underperform this time around for he is a true leader.

Balack is a good player but not the only German. In fact his contribution was small in the last set of games. Also, he missed many games for Chelsea while they won the Premier League.
Germany relies on some Bayern Munich players and others in the domestic league. Their club teams started to recover, Bayern plays for the Champions League trophy. The national team has a young and exceptional manager. They were the surprise at the last Euro making the final.

Do not count out France, they always over-perform like in 06 when they were the oldest team..

France played poorly in qualifiers and I don't see what can change. Domenech is a weak manager, probably the most contested person in the Hexagon. They were dominated by Serbia, they struggled with Ireland. Their stars are not in the best form (Benzema not catching Real line-up, Ribery mixed in all scandals, Henry not playing for Barca etc). It would be a surprise if they make it in quarter-finals ...

No African team wil win but Ghana may make quaters if they meet USA in R16.

African teams will do well, there may be one of them going to quarter-finals. However World Cup is never won by "small" teams, so the title is played between same countries.

Argentina is the Elephant in the room.

Argentina has exceptional players. In my opinion, best 2 players in the world: Messi and Milito. However you cannot go far without a skillful, experienced manager. This is why they suffered in qualifiers and this is why they will have a disappointing performance.

 

[alain]

Ah... the odds favorite is Spain and their team is impressive. Hopefully they don't crap on their pants as they usually do.

Germany is really young and lost Ballack. I wish I could say something good about them but, IMHO, they are too inexperienced.

Brazil is going to play a different style than they are known for. That reminds me of the Cup '94. They are a strong candidate as well.

The Oranje killed in the classification so I'm looking forward to see them play.

Argentina is very good on paper but Maradona might screw the whole thing up.

Italy is a dark horse. The same applies to France (they got into the cup with a hand goal), and most of the african teams. I will be really careful of Ivory Coast. If they get their act together, they can steamroll anybody.

 

[Pasion]

Why would anyone ever bet on England getting past the quarter-finals?

 

[Avinash Burra]

Italy is a dark horse. The same applies to France (they got into the cup with a hand goal), and most of the african teams. I will be really careful of Ivory Coast. If they get their act together, they can steamroll anybody.

Cote d'ivoire has some great players, but they are not going to go far because of three words. The middle one is "Goran". England fans will painfully vouch for this.

Of course, England are going to lose in the quarters to Portugal in a penalty shoot out via a dodgy refereeing decision.

 

[Andy Nguyen]

The TV schedule from ESPN for the entire tournament. Looks like most games are either 7-9am or 2pm
ESPN, Inc. 2010 FIFA World Cup Schedule | ESPN MediaZone

 

[helpteye]

African teams will do well, there may be one of them going to quarter-finals. However World Cup is never won by "small" teams, so the title is played between same countries.

Worldcup is never won by "small" teams? That's a crazy statement to make. The major teams had to be "small" before they became major teams..... Some teams are maturing.

 

[Stefan Zota]

Worldcup is never won by "small" teams? That's a crazy statement to make. The major teams had to be "small" before they became major teams..... Some teams are maturing.

If you go back through the list of winners there are basically 4 major teams:
Brazil, Italy, Germany, Argentina

These have won 14 out 18 cups. There are 2 cups before the WWII taken by Uruguay, another era. The only "exceptions" are France (1) and England (1), in both cases they were also the hosts.

There will be surprises even up to semi-finals, but the winner was rarely a "maturing" team in the last 80 years. So looking at the past winners, countries with a long football tradition like Spain or Netherlands have an outsider chance.
An African team wining the trophy would equal a revolution in this traditional sport. I am looking forward to see it in my lifetime ...

 

[atreides]

An African team wining the trophy would equal a revolution in this traditional sport. I am looking forward to see it in my lifetime ...

You may not need to wait too long,...African teams have been very successful in the U-17 World Cup (5 of 13 tournaments won by an African team with also 5 second place and 3 third place finishes by African teams), U-20 World Cup (1 of 17 tournaments won by an African team with 4 second place and 3 third place finishes by African teams) and the Olympics (we've had gold, silver and bronze finishes by African teams in the past 5 Olympics )...

For some reason, they have not been able to parlay that success onto the big stage, even though a lot of their players are doing really well in the top Clubs in Europe.

With home court advantage they might actually get their act together..you never know...It's soccer

 

[Marko]

Brazil

Brazil is the favourite in every world cup. I don't think England can win. They are good but not good enough except Rooney is the star player but the rest is so so.

Argentina probably has Lionel Messi but they don't play so well in the world cup qualifying round. If one can track down Messi, they can't play anymore likewise Inter Milan did it in the Champion leage with Barca.

I think African team may give some surprises. German is good but Ballack is out because of injury.

Anyway, my pick is still Brazil and Spain at the moment. Perhaps weather is the key factor in this world cup. Spain can't play in hot weather.

 

[alain]

any team can win the world cup. After the classification round, it's single game elimination so, all bets are off.

It always comes down to who makes the least mistakes. That's why defense tends to win championships.

 

[niski]

I can tell you guys is that almost no one here in Brazil liked very much our squad for this year world cup.

 

[dstefan]

Is that not common for Brazil? Too many good players to choose from, and everyone has an opinion on how to best make the team? (See Ronaldinho, or lackthereof )

In any case, Brazil is my perenial favorite!

 

[niski]

There are two scenarios that generate criticism:

1) Good players are left out of the squad , but there are good players to offset them.
This is inevitable due the reasons mentioned by prof. Stefanica.

2) Good playeres are left out and no one understands why instead of them, not top players are selected.

In this particular case, I´m talking about
Josué/Kleberson/J Batista / Grafite /Michael Bastos

 

[dstefan]

If Brazil wins it all, everyone will explain how the coach was a genius when selecting the players. Otherwise, the same people will explain while the coach missed a great opportunity by not selecting certain players... It is the nature of coaching - you are as good as your last results... At the very least, you get to choose the players who will decide your fate

But one again, I am rooting for Brazil to win the World Cup each and every time.

---------- Post added at 04:56 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:54 PM ----------

PS. Valdir Peres is the one player who made the most beautiful team I ever saw lose a title that should have been won easily...

 

[Andy Nguyen]

Where do I bet money on these games?