The Average Opposition Index relates only to those competitions where
there are consistent rankings in place. So with that in mind, it can be applied
to any League structure, and also to International games where every team has a
FIFA League ranking.
As much as I’d like to be able to take into account Champions and Europa
League matches, the teams are competing on a knock out basis aside from the
group stages which are too small to apply an average to.
Average opponent scored against is worked out by multiplying the
position of the opponent scored against by the number of goals. This is then
repeated for all goals, and the total is then divided by the number of total
goals.
So Rooney for example (first 9 goals 2011-12 season):
Opponent Rank No. of Goals Rank X Goals
West Brom 11th 1 11
Spurs 16th 1 16
Arsenal 14th 3 42
Bolton 10th 3 30
Chelsea 3rd 1 3
Total 9 102
So 102 divided by 9 is 11.33. This is the average ranking of the
opposition per goal for Rooney. To validate this, you can perform a normal
average to check:
=(11+16+14+14+14+10+10+10+3)/9
In the opening round of the season, the teams have no ranking. With that
in mind, their final positions from the prior season are taken used, with the
promoted teams taking the below:
- Champions = 18th
- Second Automatic
Spot = 19th
- Play Off Winners
= 20th
The opposition ranking takes the League Position of each team at the
start of the round of fixtures. So if the Saturday results mean that the Sunday
rankings are available, this will be ignored. If it’s weekend fixtures, then it
will be based on the table before any games have kicked off.
The same calculation will be performed at the end of the season and for
historical comparisons based on the Final Standings of each team, rather than
the position at the time of playing.
Goals per Range:
Whereas the Average Opposition measurement may contain anomalies,
another way to track the Big Game Players or Flat Track Bullies is to group
their goals into ranges of difficulty.
In most leagues, and certainly the Premier League this season, the Top 6
teams are all a cut above the rest of the league. Similarly, you’ll generally
find around 6 teams battling against the drop each season. With that in mind
the following groupings have been applied:
Top 6: 1st-6th
Mid 8: 7th-14th
Bottom 6: 15th-20th
Based on these ranges, you’d expect the big game players to have more in
the Top 6 category, with the Flat Track Bullies normally wracking them up
against the Bottom 6 range.
Goals as Points:
It’s not an exact science, but if you take out the goals scored by each
player, you can calculate the amount of points that the goals have been worth.
For example, if a player scores in a 1-0 win, then his goal has been worth 2
points as the team would have drawn without it (worth 1 point)
The above table gives further examples of the points won by goals. An
interesting one is that 2 goals in a 3 goal win means the player will be
responsible for no points in that game. This is sometimes harsh as the player
may have scored his team’s first 2 goals, with the 3rd and 4th scored late on
when the opposition chase an equaliser.
What this parameter doesn’t take into account is the order of the goal.
As mentioned in a Premier League update, “you could for example take Chelsea’s
3-1 win over Norwich last season. As Chelsea won by two goals and had
three different goal scorers, take one of Bosingwa’s, Lampard’s or Mata’s goals
away and the result would still be 2-1 to Chelsea – meaning that there is no
direct impact to the result and number of points. In reality – the opening goal
of a game is always important (Bosingwa), and Frank Lampard’s goal in that
match was in the 84th minute, which put Chelsea back ahead. Both were important
goals, but due to Mata’s injury time goal – the importance in this formula
lessens.”
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