[Football] BBC journalists' Championship predictions - how poor?

Gwylan · May 31, 2018

This made for interesting reading
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/44243021

It did make me wonder about the quality of BBC sports journalism though - how could any journalist who "covers the Championship regularly" think Cardiff would go down. Is there a manager who knows that division better than Warnock? How many teams has he taken up? Surely a side that was in the Prem a couple of years ago under a manager like that, would be near the top?

And how could anyone predict Sunderland would win the league? Virtually everyone who watches football knows they're a basket case club. I thought they'd go down - and so did loads of people on NSC.

It does make me wonder what recruitment processes they have at the BBC

blockhseagull · May 31, 2018

I see your point about Cardiff and Sunderland but otherwise they aren’t a million miles away, they got 5 of the top 6 pretty much and there are always a few clubs that surprise everyone and overachieve (Cardiff/Millwall) and underachieve (Massive/Norwich)

There will always be a big club bias from some journos but they haven’t done that bad

Gwylan · May 31, 2018

blockhseagull said:
I see your point about Cardiff and Sunderland but otherwise they aren’t a million miles away, they got 5 of the top 6 pretty much and there are always a few clubs that surprise everyone and overachieve (Cardiff/Millwall) and underachieve (Massive/Norwich)

There will always be a big club bias from some journos but they haven’t done that bad

But anyone who follows football would have made a decent stab at it - you don't have to be a seasoned observer to have predicted that Villa, Fulham, Boro and Derby would be in the top 6. And if I'd been guessing I think I'd have got the bottom four too. Millwall was a shock but I wouldn't have had them as relegation candidates - not one journalist had them higher than 20th.

If NSC had made predictions and we'd counted them up, I bet we'd have had pretty much the same result. And we're not experts ...

el punal · May 31, 2018

According to FourFourTwo magazine their predictions for us for 2015/16 season was a relegation spot, and in 2016/17 a measly 8th place. You predict at your peril!

Stat Brother · May 31, 2018

Can't we just agree that predicting the final positions of a 38 or 46 game season is all but impossible.
It's merely a space filler and should be treated as a bit of fun.

In much the same way that bookies odds are purely a response to the most recent results, while attempting to get your money without losing any of their own.

blockhseagull · May 31, 2018

Gwylan said:
But anyone who follows football would have made a decent stab at it - you don't have to be a seasoned observer to have predicted that Villa, Fulham, Boro and Derby would be in the top 6. And if I'd been guessing I think I'd have got the bottom four too. Millwall was a shock but I wouldn't have had them as relegation candidates - not one journalist had them higher than 20th.

If NSC had made predictions and we'd counted them up, I bet we'd have had pretty much the same result. And we're not experts ...

Can’t agree regarding the championship if I’m honest, massively unpredictable which is why it’s such a great league.

Munkfish · May 31, 2018

Gwylan said:
This made for interesting reading
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/44243021

It did make me wonder about the quality of BBC sports journalism though - how could any journalist who "covers the Championship regularly" think Cardiff would go down. Is there a manager who knows that division better than Warnock? How many teams has he taken up? Surely a side that was in the Prem a couple of years ago under a manager like that, would be near the top?

And how could anyone predict Sunderland would win the league? Virtually everyone who watches football knows they're a basket case club. I thought they'd go down - and so did loads of people on NSC.

It does make me wonder what recruitment processes they have at the BBC

I think you are being a tad harsh, why don't you predict the league next season and come back to us with how well you did, I will do it with you if you want.

MattBackHome · May 31, 2018

Gwylan said:
But anyone who follows football would have made a decent stab at it - you don't have to be a seasoned observer to have predicted that Villa, Fulham, Boro and Derby would be in the top 6. And if I'd been guessing I think I'd have got the bottom four too. Millwall was a shock but I wouldn't have had them as relegation candidates - not one journalist had them higher than 20th.

If NSC had made predictions and we'd counted them up, I bet we'd have had pretty much the same result. And we're not experts ...

Here are NSC predictions made last summer: http://www.northstandchat.com/showthread.php?352715-Next-season-s-Championship

They are, to be kind, a mixed bag.

Mine is particularly shit.

strings · May 31, 2018

A bit of quick maths tells me that on average, the pre-season predictions were 6 places out from the final league positions. That goes to show how useless these pre-season prediction tables really are.

Tom Bombadil · May 31, 2018

The championship is so difficult to predict, that i don't see much problem with that. Sure some people will always overestimate big clubs and relegated clubs. I virtually every year we wee in the that league people worrying that " next year would be tougher" because of the alleged strength of every club relegated fro the PL and promoted from L1. Truth is most times the one or two of the relegated clubs struggle and not every year will a L1 club maintain momentum into a promotion push. Add in the sort of variation appointing the wrong manager can have ( see Mr S. Hyppia) or indeed the right manager ( see Mr C. Hughton) then it can be all but impossible to predict a final result.
It's not like the PL where we can predict the top 6 already and be pretty sure to get at least 5 out of 6 correct

chaileyjem · May 31, 2018

Gwylan said:
It does make me wonder what recruitment processes they have at the BBC

Agreed. They must let in some right idiots.

Gwylan · May 31, 2018

MattBackHome said:
Here are NSC predictions made last summer: http://www.northstandchat.com/showthread.php?352715-Next-season-s-Championship

They are, to be kind, a mixed bag.

Mine is particularly shit.

I hadn't seen that thread but it does seem to support what I was saying: pretty much everyone predicted Villa, Boro, Derby and Fulham in the top 6. Most people said Brentford would be there and there were plenty who thought Sunderland would struggle.

And there was a prediction for Cardiff and a couple of people said Millwall would do well.

I know the Championship's unpredictable but my point is that if we'd asked all those people to predict the exact table, we'd be somewhere in line with the experts' predictions (perhaps slightly better). But surely experts should do a lot better?

Stat Brother · May 31, 2018

Gwylan said:
I hadn't seen that thread but it does seem to support what I was saying: pretty much everyone predicted Villa, Boro, Derby and Fulham in the top 6. Most people said Brentford would be there and there were plenty who thought Sunderland would struggle.

And there was a prediction for Cardiff and a couple of people said Millwall would do well.

I know the Championship's unpredictable but my point is that if we'd asked all those people to predict the exact table, we'd be somewhere in line with the experts' predictions (perhaps slightly better). But surely experts should do a lot better?

Odd.
There are 55 replies, only one that is noteworthy :jester:

I could pick a few equally random replies that prove the exact opposite:-

1 Middlesbrough
2 Fulham
3 Derby
4 Norwich
5 Sheff Wed
6 Birmingham

Brentford would definately be my dark horse. Done some good business this window but need to keep Jota I think, and Judge back to best

My top 2 are Villa and Derby

Dark horse? Forest because of Warburton.

blockhseagull · May 31, 2018

Gwylan said:
I hadn't seen that thread but it does seem to support what I was saying: pretty much everyone predicted Villa, Boro, Derby and Fulham in the top 6. Most people said Brentford would be there and there were plenty who thought Sunderland would struggle.

And there was a prediction for Cardiff and a couple of people said Millwall would do well.

I know the Championship's unpredictable but my point is that if we'd asked all those people to predict the exact table, we'd be somewhere in line with the experts' predictions (perhaps slightly better). But surely experts should do a lot better?

You’ve said it’s unpredictable.... yet said experts should be able to predict it ?

Not sure how it’s possible to predict the whole table myself, can have a stab at top and maybe bottom but that’s about it.

Like trying to predict the grand national and what horse is falling when ! For example most people predicted Massive to do well, but no one could have foreseen how many injuries they would get and land up struggling

Beanstalk · May 31, 2018

Me and a bunch of old school mates do a full Premier League prediction every year. Essentially, we predict all places before the first game, and after the January transfer window shuts.

Our winner this year got 13/40. Predicting places are impossible to get bang on. Oddly, I got the Albion spot on at the start of the season but Leicester were my only other correct guess.

Looking through the article, they haven't done an awful job.

father_and_son · May 31, 2018

Whenever you look at statistics (in this instance, the average predicted position) then a few outliers will always look ridiculous... that's why we use averages, means, modes, etc

I think that the average results from the 25 BBC journos is actually pretty good.

If you looked in detail at those outliers I'm sure that it wasn't "stupidity" that generated them but more likely, "blind optimism" or club rivalries (I have no doubt the person who said Sunderland would win is a Sunderland fan and had you asked him/her to bet their house on Sunderland's final position, there is no way they would have said "top").

Icy Gull · May 31, 2018

No idea where I posted it but I predicted Wolves and Fulham but no way did I expect Cardiff to go up.

Weststander · May 31, 2018

The BBC journalists do the predictable thing of going by income. Subject to the odd basket case like Sunderland, it is best way to predict final league position. Money simply buys better first teams and squads, and generally league success.

Next season’s PL - ManU and ManC have the 2 most expensive squads on the planet by £100m’s, so should take the top 2 places again.

Championship - Villa, WBA, Stoke and Boro have high income with little non-owner debt, so should fare well.

Pavilionaire · May 31, 2018

Voroshilov said:
It's not like the PL where we can predict the top 6 already and be pretty sure to get at least 5 out of 6 correct

That's exactly what the journalists did - picked 5 of the top 6 correctly with only Cardiff for Massive wrong.

That said, they had 4 of the actual bottom 7 finishing in the top half of the table.

Stat Brother · May 31, 2018

Just seen an advertisement where you can win £100m just by predicting the win/lose/draw results of the World Cup.

Some easy money to be made there.

Got something to say or just want fewer pesky ads? Join us... 😊

[Football] BBC journalists' Championship predictions - how poor?

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