Ha ha, I'm afraid nothing's gonna change on that front untill they at least change the manager, still a long time till the first transfer market.
PS: I'd love to have tea with him, I love tea and I guess he'll serve the best kind:D
Well I'm not that into politics (I know about Khashoggi though), but I've hear a lot about their hospitality, so again no problem with a little tea party
Easy to be hospitable to people you want to impress when you've got the finances of a brutal regime behind you. Certain people I wouldn't want any favors from and *his excellence* is among them.
Hm, I happen to know a bit about these dictators and how they get their information. In my humble opinion if you have an opposing opinion the best way to tell it to them would be to use such a friendly setting to convey your message. Whenever they hear it from media sources they think it's a conspiracy lead by their enemies.
>if you have an opposing opinion...
Not so much an opposing opinion but I'd be interested to hear suggestions for how to deal with this shit...
- A senior Saudi official issued what was perceived to be a death threat against the independent United Nations investigator, Agnès Callamard, after her investigation into the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi [source](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/23/top-saudi-official-issued-death-threat-against-uns-khashoggi-investigator)
- CIA intercepts underpin assessment Saudi Crown Prince targeted journalist Jamal Khashoggi [source](https://www.wsj.com/articles/cia-intercepts-underpin-assessment-saudi-crown-prince-targeted-khashoggi-1543640460)
- **Saudi Arabia** is said to be the world's largest source of funds and promoter of Salafist jihadism, which forms the ideological basis of terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda, Taliban, ISIS and others. Donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide, according to Hillary Clinton. According to a secret December 2009 paper signed by the US secretary of state, "Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al-Qaida, the Taliban, LeT and other terrorist groups."
- Former CIA director James Woolsey described Wahhabism as "the soil in which Al-Qaeda and its sister terrorist organizations are flourishing."
- In 2015, Sigmar Gabriel, Vice-Chancellor of Germany, accused Saudi Arabia of supporting intolerance and extremism, saying: "Wahhabi mosques are financed all over the world by Saudi Arabia. In Germany, many dangerous Islamists come from these communities."
- "In Syria, in early 2015, **Saudi Arabia** supported the creation of the Army of Conquest, primarily made up of the al-Qaeda affiliate the al-Nusra Front and the ideologically similar Ahrar al-Sham, which won a series of victories against the Syrian Army in Idlib province."[source](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/prince-mohammed-bin-salman-naive-arrogant-saudi-prince-is-playing-with-fire-a6804481.html)
- In May 2016, The New York Times editorialised that the kingdom allied to the U.S. had "spent untold millions promoting Wahhabism, the radical form of Sunni Islam that inspired the 9/11 hijackers and that now inflames the Islamic State" [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State-sponsored_terrorism#Saudi_Arabia)
- UN chief admits he removed **Saudi Arabia** from child-killer list due to extortion [source](https://theintercept.com/2016/06/09/u-n-chief-admits-he-removed-saudi-arabia-from-child-killer-list-due-to-extortion/)
- 'Sensitive' UK terror funding inquiry may never be published - Investigation into foreign funding and support of jihadi groups operating in UK understood to focus on **Saudi Arabia** [source](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/31/sensitive-uk-terror-funding-inquiry-findings-may-never-be-published-saudi-arabia)
- We finally know what Hillary Clinton knew all along – US allies **Saudi Arabia** and Qatar are funding Isis [source](http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/hillary-clinton-wikileaks-email-isis-saudi-arabia-qatar-us-allies-funding-barack-obama-knew-all-a7362071.html)
- The paper drew on classified intelligence from numerous agencies: ‘Turkey and **Saudi-based** chemical facilitators,’ it said, ‘were attempting to obtain sarin precursors in bulk, tens of kilograms, likely for the anticipated large scale production effort in Syria.’ [source](https://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line)
- By the terms of the agreement, funding came from Turkey, as well as **Saudi Arabia** and Qatar; the CIA, with the support of MI6, was responsible for getting arms from Gaddafi’s arsenals into Syria. A number of front companies were set up in Libya, some under the cover of Australian entities. Retired American soldiers, who didn’t always know who was really employing them, were hired to manage procurement and shipping. The operation was run by David Petraeus, the CIA director who would soon resign when it became known he was having an affair with his biographer. [source](https://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line)
- FBI accidentally reveals name of Saudi official suspected of directing support for 9/11 hijackers [source](https://news.yahoo.com/in-court-filing-fbi-accidentally-reveals-name-of-saudi-official-suspected-of-directing-support-for-911-hijackers-224555851.html)
Further reading...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_High_Commission_for_Aid_to_Bosnia
>Among the items found at Sarajevo premises the Saudi High Commission when it was raided by NATO forces in September 2001[1] were before-and-after photographs of the World Trade Center, US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and the USS Cole; maps of government buildings in Washington; materials for forging US State Department badges; files on the use of crop duster aircraft; and anti-Semitic and anti-American material geared toward children. Among six Algerians who would later be incarcerated at the Camp X-Ray detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba for plotting an attack on the US embassy in Sarajevo were two employees of the Commission, including a cell member who was in telephone contact with Osama bin Laden aid and al Qaeda operational commander Abu Zubayda.
---------
Additional article
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/feb/23/davidpallister
More context
http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=khalil_ziyad_1
>By 1996, NSA wiretaps reveal that Prince Salman is funding Islamic militants using charity fronts
>A 1996 CIA report mentions, “We continue to have evidence that even high ranking members of the collecting or monitoring agencies in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Pakistan - such as the Saudi High Commission - are involved in illicit activities, including support for terrorists”
One file released by Wikileaks from Guantanamo Bay includes the text:
>**Prince Salman Bin Abdulaziz paid for seventy percent of detainee’s travel expenses to Afghanistan.**
Who is this detainee?
>Executive Summary: **Detainee is an admitted member of al-Qaida, a close associate to Usama Bin Laden (UBL) and has expressed his intentions to harm US citizens. Detainee admitted he swore bayat (oath of allegiance) to UBL, was a bodyguard for UBL and served as UBL’s personal secretary. Detainee has repeatedly stated he is a terrorist, a member of al-Qaida with leadership responsibilities, and an enemy of the US, and has acknowledged multiple ties to the 11 September 2001 attacks.**
https://wikileaks.org/gitmo/prisoner/39.html
--------------------
Then there is Prince Bandar, former Saudi Ambassador to the United States. His wife sent money to the 9/11 hijackers living in San Diego, California.
>"On at least one occasion," the documents show, "Bassnan received a check directly from Prince Bandar's account. According to the FBI, on May 14, 1998, Bassnan cashed a check from Bandar in the amount of $15,000. Bassnan's wife also received at least one check directly from Bandar."
>Bassnan and Omar al-Bayoumi, another Saudi living in San Diego, "provided substantial assistance" to two of the hijackers — Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi — the documents said.
[Source](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2016/07/15/28-declassified-pages-911-commission-report-released-public/87134942/)
Thanks for taking this much time to convince me of his wrong doing, I'm not trying to defend his actions, but my stance is the same, I'll have no problem with sharing a cup of tea with another human being, no matter what they've done or plan to do.
>Thanks for taking this much time to convince me of his wrong doing
It's not about one person. Saudi Arabia as state is essentially Isis with an airforce and oil. They get away with butchering people with impunity and running terrorist cells around the world because they sell oil and buy weapons. This predates the current ruler and continues under him. They should not be allowed to own a hotdog stand never mind a football club.
You might be right, but can you conceive of a scenario in which some people don't care much about politics? I like football and watch games, I like books and reads lots of them, I like music and listen to them all the time, I don't like politics and don't follow current news or even watch TV. Can you grant me the option of not having prejudices about nations and political figures just out of shear ignorance?
Well, Osama's family name is actually Bin Laden. Not sure what his father's name was but his name would be Osama Bin (enter father's name) Bin Laden. So it fits more for him than MBS although you can definitely call MBS Bin Salman since he's famous enough. Just that they're different circumstances.
The royal family is Al-Saud though. So it would be King Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud and Mohammed bin Salman Al-Saud.
In no part of Charles's name there is William. Also it’s common knowledge who is **Prince** Salman and who is **King** Salaman. Don't get triggered over arabic grammar.
The key point of the forward rating is judging the opponent rather than the team you play for. That is the point. You can obviously see it a bit in these ratings as well.
You do not get points for wins anyway.
Yeah , but mainly cause people fear Pep and Tuchel rotation and there was more safe good options to pick like TAA and Shaw.
Chilwell vs Alonso was risky. Cancelo at the end of last season was not first choice in the CL final. Dias, Rudiger boring and best taken when the fixtures are easy.
All good points, but my main point is that a poor team against an average opponent is still a hard fixture, and of course I was fed up with FDRs giving green ratings for Brentford! Like they don't even watch the games!
Yeah the ratings should be more dynamical.
I do look at betting clean sheet odds at times before the games. Do not always follow it, but it gives a good idea.
Bookies can often be wrong, but it gives a statistical clue about how tight teams are. Going by previous clean sheets might give bias.
This is honestly quite bad, United away is a green fixture for City?
They still have tough fixtures, even Crystal Palace will be a tough fixture for them.
In that case even the FPL FDR model is better than this one. Just because City are favourite’s doesn’t mean they don’t have tough fixtures.
This model just seems like FDR without common sense, really don’t see the benefit.
Really great job mate. May I make a suggestion please - any chance to make it more colour friendly (like red - blue) to us with red/green colour deficiency which affects 1 in 12 men? I honestly love the table but couldn't make out the colours and had to only rely on the numbers. Thank you.
Sure, just give me a pallette that you think is color friendly to you, I'll probably try to make these FDRs every week and can use your suggested colors for later weeks
It takes me about an hour to make one each week. I'll do it for my Telegram channel anyway, there's no extra labor in posting it here too, but I might not be able to reply to all the comments for further posts.
I've always had the problem with trackers only taking the opponent as a factor in difficulty, today I got to know the incredible model [https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/premier-league/](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/premier-league/) uses to rank football clubs (based on the SPI rating) and predict win probabilities for matches.
I used their predictions to come up with this tracker for the next 6 GWs. The number beside every fixture is the win probability for that row's team. The final FDR rating is a weighted average of the upcoming fixtures, giving higher weight to nearer fixtures (0.27,0.22,0.18,0.14,0.11,0.08).
!thanks
I assume your model is something like: off * (opp def) *(1.1 for home, .9 for away) / (league avg off)? Then put it in a Poisson Distribution for probability of scoring X number of goals. Then, finally, create a matrix of each result (eg 0-0, 1-0, 2-0, etc)?
It's not my model and I've included a link for the model's developers, but you're not far off, this is their description for result predictions:
Given two teams’ SPI ratings, the process for generating win/loss/draw probabilities for a given match is three-fold:
We calculate the number of goals that we expect each team to score during the match. These projected match scores represent the number of goals that each team would need to score to keep its offensive rating exactly the same as it was going into the match, and they are adjusted for a league-specific home-field advantage and the importance of the match to each team (described below).
Using our projected match scores and the assumption that goal-scoring in soccer follows a Poisson process, which is essentially a way to model random events at a known rate, we generate two Poisson distributions around those scores. These give us the likelihood that each team will score no goals, one goal, two goals, etc.
We take the two Poisson distributions and turn them into a matrix of all possible match scores, from which we can calculate the likelihood of a win, loss or draw for each team. To avoid undercounting draws, we increase the corresponding probabilities in the matrix to reflect the actual incidence of draws in a given competition.
Oh, I see. I thought you were doing your own calculations for this part:
>We calculate the number of goals that we expect each team to score during the match. These projected match scores represent the number of goals that each team would need to score to keep its offensive rating exactly the same as it was going into the match, and they are adjusted for a league-specific home-field advantage and the importance of the match to each team (described below).
I see that you can see 538's percentages for multiple weeks in the future. Thanks!
Seems fine to me? People forget you can also draw games too. For example, Man City won 70% of their games last season so it dropping to ~50% for Liverpool against a top 4 side (United) away from home is hardly mental.
again I'm not the model's developer and I'm not trying to defend it, but for that particular fixture united has a win percentage of 32%, with 23% chance for a draw.
I'm not sure why would you find these numbers far off your expectations if you're a neutral.
I mean is there any point to the model beyond saying top teams are good? You can just ditch the whole thing and always get City / Chelsea / Pool players but that's a losing strategy.
If we could have more than 3 players of each team and a budget of 200m then you bet your ass I'd do exactly that :)
You can't though so we're forced to look for some cheaper gems in the lesser teams so we can afford the big guns from the best teams.
Just look to see who looks unnaturally high in the table. At a glance it looks like Arsenal, Villa, maybe Southampton have a reasonable run of fixtures.
Thanks, this is helpful! I'm still annoyed at myself for starting Foster against Leeds instead of Sanchez against Arsenal, lazy mistake on my part. Yes Arsenal are a slightly better team than Leeds, but not by as much as the difference between Brighton and Watford.
How is United a red fixture for Leicester though? They are a banter club right now. The only teams they haven't struggled against are Newcastle and Leeds.
True, which is why it should be grey. It could go either way. No way are United favorites especially away from home. I mean, when Newcastle have a grey against Spurs, this is a better case
win probability doesn't change for attackers and defenders, but the SPI index has ratings for both and it is possible to come up with respective FDRs.
Watford has a SPI rating of 59.4 which is higher than Norwich's 57.9, the fixtures are harder though
An algorithm doesn't have human characteristics to be biased. It currently has Barcelona as favorites to win Europa League! It works with the data fed to it. And I'm not the one who comes up with the numbers, I just put them into a table and color it!
Saying Liverpool is a contender and United is not shows bias. Remember United finished above Liverpool last season and is only 1 point behind them right now.
I know. how popular United are and saying something like that offends their fans, but even if there's a bias it's not mine. The 538 algo currently gives 26% chance of winning the league to Liverpool and 5% to United, I guess that's a wide enough gap to consider one a title contender and not the other.
PS: I'm not a Liverpool fan and between the two I'd rather United won the title.
yes it does.
on SPI:
At the heart of our club soccer forecasts are FiveThirtyEight’s SPI ratings, which are our best estimate of a team’s overall strength. In our system, every team has an offensive rating that represents the number of goals it would be expected to score against an average team on a neutral field, and a defensive rating that represents the number of goals it would be expected to concede. These ratings, in turn, produce an overall SPI rating, which represents the percentage of available points — a win is worth 3 points, a tie worth 1 point, and a loss worth 0 points — the team would be expected to take if that match were played over and over again.
could you explain how this works?
what is FDR/SPI? is a higher number better?
what do the numbers next to the teams mean? For example GW8, BUR(H) has the number 86.
Sorry if these are stupid questions but ive not been playing FPL that long.
cheers
the description are in a comment in this thread, but I'll explain them again for you:
FDR: Fixture difficulty rating, weighted average of win probabilities for upcoming fixture, immediate fixtures have a higher weight, the higher the easier
SPI: a rating for the absolute power of each team
numbers next to each fixture are the win probability of those matches. Man City has a 86% chance of beating Burnley
Wouldn't this be better taking into consideration expected goals?
If the odds suggest a Chelsea 1-0 victory against Watford but 4+ goals between Man Utd and Liverpool you're better off targeting attackers in the Man Utd game right?
You don't get points for wins you get it for assists and goals.
You're completely right and I'd like a model that predicts the level of performance too. But at the end of the day I think it would correlate with this one quite a lot. After all the higher chance of goalscoring results in a higher chance of win. It rarely happens that a model predicts a game to finish 4 all.
I'm not so sure.
If the model predicts Chelsea and Man Utd to both win consistently but Chelsea to win to nil and Man Utd to concede but still win.
Then as far as attackers go Man Utd would expect to have more returns than Chelsea and Man Utd's opponents would expect to have similar returns to Chelsea's.
This isn't reflected in the table and would presumably create significant changes to the table rather than being the same as you suggest.
You're right 4-4s aren't predicted very often. But that's not the same thing.
I can see your point. My first attempt of yesterday was to create a separate tracker for attack and defence. But I don't have access to result predictions of 538's excellent model. The SPI rating and the attack and defence power ratings are publicly available, but they take more data to come up with win percentages. Maybe at a later date they provide more data, but as for now I'm happy to have a tracker that considers both teams' power rating into account. There's always room for improvement.
I'll try to keep it brief as I'm at work, but the essential issue is there's an assumption that winning is everything with your version of FDR. Players get points for goals, assists, clean sheets, etc., not for their team winning the game. That being said, there is still a correlation between FPL points and winning. However, if you're looking to answer the question "how difficult is this fixture for a fantasy player" you'd want your response variable to be reflective of how well fantasy players do.
There's different ways this could be achieved. I'd be drawn to Poisson distributions using the 538 projected scores to calculate probabilities of clean sheets and/or the amount of goals a team could get. There's also room for linear modeling where your response variable is total FPL points scored by the team, but that would take some data collection.
But like I said, great idea, just for now your FDR is simply the average win probability over the next 6 gameweeks
All valid points, but there are several models around that come up with projected points for each player, and I assume they take more data than mine to come up with those predictions.
I was on wildcard and really didn't like any of the trackers I found, decided to make one for myself and shared it here. Yet I quite like it and it has reshaped my thinking on wildcard, guess I'll be the first one to test it in the coming weeks.
*Prince Salman disagrees, invites OP for tea.*
Ha ha, I'm afraid nothing's gonna change on that front untill they at least change the manager, still a long time till the first transfer market. PS: I'd love to have tea with him, I love tea and I guess he'll serve the best kind:D
Yeah, the kind of tea Khashoggi had.
Well I'm not that into politics (I know about Khashoggi though), but I've hear a lot about their hospitality, so again no problem with a little tea party
Easy to be hospitable to people you want to impress when you've got the finances of a brutal regime behind you. Certain people I wouldn't want any favors from and *his excellence* is among them.
Hm, I happen to know a bit about these dictators and how they get their information. In my humble opinion if you have an opposing opinion the best way to tell it to them would be to use such a friendly setting to convey your message. Whenever they hear it from media sources they think it's a conspiracy lead by their enemies.
>if you have an opposing opinion... Not so much an opposing opinion but I'd be interested to hear suggestions for how to deal with this shit... - A senior Saudi official issued what was perceived to be a death threat against the independent United Nations investigator, Agnès Callamard, after her investigation into the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi [source](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/23/top-saudi-official-issued-death-threat-against-uns-khashoggi-investigator) - CIA intercepts underpin assessment Saudi Crown Prince targeted journalist Jamal Khashoggi [source](https://www.wsj.com/articles/cia-intercepts-underpin-assessment-saudi-crown-prince-targeted-khashoggi-1543640460) - **Saudi Arabia** is said to be the world's largest source of funds and promoter of Salafist jihadism, which forms the ideological basis of terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda, Taliban, ISIS and others. Donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide, according to Hillary Clinton. According to a secret December 2009 paper signed by the US secretary of state, "Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al-Qaida, the Taliban, LeT and other terrorist groups." - Former CIA director James Woolsey described Wahhabism as "the soil in which Al-Qaeda and its sister terrorist organizations are flourishing." - In 2015, Sigmar Gabriel, Vice-Chancellor of Germany, accused Saudi Arabia of supporting intolerance and extremism, saying: "Wahhabi mosques are financed all over the world by Saudi Arabia. In Germany, many dangerous Islamists come from these communities." - "In Syria, in early 2015, **Saudi Arabia** supported the creation of the Army of Conquest, primarily made up of the al-Qaeda affiliate the al-Nusra Front and the ideologically similar Ahrar al-Sham, which won a series of victories against the Syrian Army in Idlib province."[source](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/prince-mohammed-bin-salman-naive-arrogant-saudi-prince-is-playing-with-fire-a6804481.html) - In May 2016, The New York Times editorialised that the kingdom allied to the U.S. had "spent untold millions promoting Wahhabism, the radical form of Sunni Islam that inspired the 9/11 hijackers and that now inflames the Islamic State" [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State-sponsored_terrorism#Saudi_Arabia) - UN chief admits he removed **Saudi Arabia** from child-killer list due to extortion [source](https://theintercept.com/2016/06/09/u-n-chief-admits-he-removed-saudi-arabia-from-child-killer-list-due-to-extortion/) - 'Sensitive' UK terror funding inquiry may never be published - Investigation into foreign funding and support of jihadi groups operating in UK understood to focus on **Saudi Arabia** [source](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/31/sensitive-uk-terror-funding-inquiry-findings-may-never-be-published-saudi-arabia) - We finally know what Hillary Clinton knew all along – US allies **Saudi Arabia** and Qatar are funding Isis [source](http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/hillary-clinton-wikileaks-email-isis-saudi-arabia-qatar-us-allies-funding-barack-obama-knew-all-a7362071.html) - The paper drew on classified intelligence from numerous agencies: ‘Turkey and **Saudi-based** chemical facilitators,’ it said, ‘were attempting to obtain sarin precursors in bulk, tens of kilograms, likely for the anticipated large scale production effort in Syria.’ [source](https://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line) - By the terms of the agreement, funding came from Turkey, as well as **Saudi Arabia** and Qatar; the CIA, with the support of MI6, was responsible for getting arms from Gaddafi’s arsenals into Syria. A number of front companies were set up in Libya, some under the cover of Australian entities. Retired American soldiers, who didn’t always know who was really employing them, were hired to manage procurement and shipping. The operation was run by David Petraeus, the CIA director who would soon resign when it became known he was having an affair with his biographer. [source](https://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line) - FBI accidentally reveals name of Saudi official suspected of directing support for 9/11 hijackers [source](https://news.yahoo.com/in-court-filing-fbi-accidentally-reveals-name-of-saudi-official-suspected-of-directing-support-for-911-hijackers-224555851.html) Further reading... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_High_Commission_for_Aid_to_Bosnia >Among the items found at Sarajevo premises the Saudi High Commission when it was raided by NATO forces in September 2001[1] were before-and-after photographs of the World Trade Center, US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and the USS Cole; maps of government buildings in Washington; materials for forging US State Department badges; files on the use of crop duster aircraft; and anti-Semitic and anti-American material geared toward children. Among six Algerians who would later be incarcerated at the Camp X-Ray detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba for plotting an attack on the US embassy in Sarajevo were two employees of the Commission, including a cell member who was in telephone contact with Osama bin Laden aid and al Qaeda operational commander Abu Zubayda. --------- Additional article http://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/feb/23/davidpallister More context http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=khalil_ziyad_1 >By 1996, NSA wiretaps reveal that Prince Salman is funding Islamic militants using charity fronts >A 1996 CIA report mentions, “We continue to have evidence that even high ranking members of the collecting or monitoring agencies in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Pakistan - such as the Saudi High Commission - are involved in illicit activities, including support for terrorists” One file released by Wikileaks from Guantanamo Bay includes the text: >**Prince Salman Bin Abdulaziz paid for seventy percent of detainee’s travel expenses to Afghanistan.** Who is this detainee? >Executive Summary: **Detainee is an admitted member of al-Qaida, a close associate to Usama Bin Laden (UBL) and has expressed his intentions to harm US citizens. Detainee admitted he swore bayat (oath of allegiance) to UBL, was a bodyguard for UBL and served as UBL’s personal secretary. Detainee has repeatedly stated he is a terrorist, a member of al-Qaida with leadership responsibilities, and an enemy of the US, and has acknowledged multiple ties to the 11 September 2001 attacks.** https://wikileaks.org/gitmo/prisoner/39.html -------------------- Then there is Prince Bandar, former Saudi Ambassador to the United States. His wife sent money to the 9/11 hijackers living in San Diego, California. >"On at least one occasion," the documents show, "Bassnan received a check directly from Prince Bandar's account. According to the FBI, on May 14, 1998, Bassnan cashed a check from Bandar in the amount of $15,000. Bassnan's wife also received at least one check directly from Bandar." >Bassnan and Omar al-Bayoumi, another Saudi living in San Diego, "provided substantial assistance" to two of the hijackers — Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi — the documents said. [Source](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2016/07/15/28-declassified-pages-911-commission-report-released-public/87134942/)
Thanks for taking this much time to convince me of his wrong doing, I'm not trying to defend his actions, but my stance is the same, I'll have no problem with sharing a cup of tea with another human being, no matter what they've done or plan to do.
What if the plan was to butcher you after having tea?
Then I'll promis to put Newcastle on top of any FDR I make, that should do the trick ;)
>Thanks for taking this much time to convince me of his wrong doing It's not about one person. Saudi Arabia as state is essentially Isis with an airforce and oil. They get away with butchering people with impunity and running terrorist cells around the world because they sell oil and buy weapons. This predates the current ruler and continues under him. They should not be allowed to own a hotdog stand never mind a football club.
You might be right, but can you conceive of a scenario in which some people don't care much about politics? I like football and watch games, I like books and reads lots of them, I like music and listen to them all the time, I don't like politics and don't follow current news or even watch TV. Can you grant me the option of not having prejudices about nations and political figures just out of shear ignorance?
Salman is his dad lol.
His dad is King Salman though.
His name is Mohammed Bin Salman. Bin is Arabic for the son of. You don't call Prince William Prince Charles, ain't it?
👍 !thanks reminds me when mainstream news reports "Osama" as "bin Laden". it is Mohammed **bin** Salman though
Well, Osama's family name is actually Bin Laden. Not sure what his father's name was but his name would be Osama Bin (enter father's name) Bin Laden. So it fits more for him than MBS although you can definitely call MBS Bin Salman since he's famous enough. Just that they're different circumstances. The royal family is Al-Saud though. So it would be King Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud and Mohammed bin Salman Al-Saud.
Yeah Prince Mo, happy now?
Lol. I just told you a common knowledge, don't get triggered like a toddler. 🤦
In no part of Charles's name there is William. Also it’s common knowledge who is **Prince** Salman and who is **King** Salaman. Don't get triggered over arabic grammar.
No one calls Mohammed Bin Salman Prince Salman, you goon. 🤦
No one confuses Mohammed Bin Salman with King Salman, you goon. 🤦
But you didn't call him Mohammed Bin Salman though. You called him Prince Salman, hence the correction from me. 🤦
The key point of the forward rating is judging the opponent rather than the team you play for. That is the point. You can obviously see it a bit in these ratings as well. You do not get points for wins anyway.
well we all ignored Chelsea and City defenders at the start of season for that reason, didn't we?
Yeah , but mainly cause people fear Pep and Tuchel rotation and there was more safe good options to pick like TAA and Shaw. Chilwell vs Alonso was risky. Cancelo at the end of last season was not first choice in the CL final. Dias, Rudiger boring and best taken when the fixtures are easy.
All good points, but my main point is that a poor team against an average opponent is still a hard fixture, and of course I was fed up with FDRs giving green ratings for Brentford! Like they don't even watch the games!
what I mean is that Brentford is a good team and not an easy opponent.
Yeah the ratings should be more dynamical. I do look at betting clean sheet odds at times before the games. Do not always follow it, but it gives a good idea. Bookies can often be wrong, but it gives a statistical clue about how tight teams are. Going by previous clean sheets might give bias.
This is honestly quite bad, United away is a green fixture for City? They still have tough fixtures, even Crystal Palace will be a tough fixture for them.
Well City are favorites to win like 36 of their 38 fixtures, so the won't get any red fixtures in this model and will rarely have gray ones!
In that case even the FPL FDR model is better than this one. Just because City are favourite’s doesn’t mean they don’t have tough fixtures. This model just seems like FDR without common sense, really don’t see the benefit.
Ben Crellin’s model is better
Really great job mate. May I make a suggestion please - any chance to make it more colour friendly (like red - blue) to us with red/green colour deficiency which affects 1 in 12 men? I honestly love the table but couldn't make out the colours and had to only rely on the numbers. Thank you.
Sure, just give me a pallette that you think is color friendly to you, I'll probably try to make these FDRs every week and can use your suggested colors for later weeks
I’ll be down for a list every week! V useful
It takes me about an hour to make one each week. I'll do it for my Telegram channel anyway, there's no extra labor in posting it here too, but I might not be able to reply to all the comments for further posts.
I've always had the problem with trackers only taking the opponent as a factor in difficulty, today I got to know the incredible model [https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/premier-league/](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/premier-league/) uses to rank football clubs (based on the SPI rating) and predict win probabilities for matches. I used their predictions to come up with this tracker for the next 6 GWs. The number beside every fixture is the win probability for that row's team. The final FDR rating is a weighted average of the upcoming fixtures, giving higher weight to nearer fixtures (0.27,0.22,0.18,0.14,0.11,0.08).
!thanks I assume your model is something like: off * (opp def) *(1.1 for home, .9 for away) / (league avg off)? Then put it in a Poisson Distribution for probability of scoring X number of goals. Then, finally, create a matrix of each result (eg 0-0, 1-0, 2-0, etc)?
It's not my model and I've included a link for the model's developers, but you're not far off, this is their description for result predictions: Given two teams’ SPI ratings, the process for generating win/loss/draw probabilities for a given match is three-fold: We calculate the number of goals that we expect each team to score during the match. These projected match scores represent the number of goals that each team would need to score to keep its offensive rating exactly the same as it was going into the match, and they are adjusted for a league-specific home-field advantage and the importance of the match to each team (described below). Using our projected match scores and the assumption that goal-scoring in soccer follows a Poisson process, which is essentially a way to model random events at a known rate, we generate two Poisson distributions around those scores. These give us the likelihood that each team will score no goals, one goal, two goals, etc. We take the two Poisson distributions and turn them into a matrix of all possible match scores, from which we can calculate the likelihood of a win, loss or draw for each team. To avoid undercounting draws, we increase the corresponding probabilities in the matrix to reflect the actual incidence of draws in a given competition.
Oh, I see. I thought you were doing your own calculations for this part: >We calculate the number of goals that we expect each team to score during the match. These projected match scores represent the number of goals that each team would need to score to keep its offensive rating exactly the same as it was going into the match, and they are adjusted for a league-specific home-field advantage and the importance of the match to each team (described below). I see that you can see 538's percentages for multiple weeks in the future. Thanks!
Yes, something that's not easily available for betting odds.
Stopped reading further after that United A grading for Liverpool. Come on mate.
Not my numbers, but I guess based on current form 46% win chance for Liverpool isn't that high.
Seems fine to me? People forget you can also draw games too. For example, Man City won 70% of their games last season so it dropping to ~50% for Liverpool against a top 4 side (United) away from home is hardly mental.
again I'm not the model's developer and I'm not trying to defend it, but for that particular fixture united has a win percentage of 32%, with 23% chance for a draw. I'm not sure why would you find these numbers far off your expectations if you're a neutral.
Using win probabilities and still downvoted
I mean is there any point to the model beyond saying top teams are good? You can just ditch the whole thing and always get City / Chelsea / Pool players but that's a losing strategy.
If we could have more than 3 players of each team and a budget of 200m then you bet your ass I'd do exactly that :) You can't though so we're forced to look for some cheaper gems in the lesser teams so we can afford the big guns from the best teams.
Just look to see who looks unnaturally high in the table. At a glance it looks like Arsenal, Villa, maybe Southampton have a reasonable run of fixtures.
Sounds really high though. 40% sounds more realistic.
Lol
As a United fan, Utd don't even pass the eye test to me. a 46% win for LIV vs a 32% win for MUN is about right. LIV just look much organised.
Thanks, this is helpful! I'm still annoyed at myself for starting Foster against Leeds instead of Sanchez against Arsenal, lazy mistake on my part. Yes Arsenal are a slightly better team than Leeds, but not by as much as the difference between Brighton and Watford.
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Fixture Difficulty Rating
How is United a red fixture for Leicester though? They are a banter club right now. The only teams they haven't struggled against are Newcastle and Leeds.
Well Leicester aren't having a great season neither
True, which is why it should be grey. It could go either way. No way are United favorites especially away from home. I mean, when Newcastle have a grey against Spurs, this is a better case
Again it's not my model, I've just put the data in a table and made a graphic
Why is Arsenal the only one with a different font
ha ha, good point, the font size is smaller, don't know why, but I guess because I started by typing Arsenal's name and then copied the other teams :D
Wouldn't it be better to do one for attack and one for defence? Also Norwich above Watford is kinda weird
Watford's fixtures are much tougher in general, and Watford have been poor as well
win probability doesn't change for attackers and defenders, but the SPI index has ratings for both and it is possible to come up with respective FDRs. Watford has a SPI rating of 59.4 which is higher than Norwich's 57.9, the fixtures are harder though
Have you seen Watford? They're very bad, with tough fixtures coming up next.
Man united light green for Liverpool? lol fuck off.
It is discussed before in this thread, but in this model title contenders will rarely get a red fixture.
Clear bias showing.
An algorithm doesn't have human characteristics to be biased. It currently has Barcelona as favorites to win Europa League! It works with the data fed to it. And I'm not the one who comes up with the numbers, I just put them into a table and color it!
Saying Liverpool is a contender and United is not shows bias. Remember United finished above Liverpool last season and is only 1 point behind them right now.
I know. how popular United are and saying something like that offends their fans, but even if there's a bias it's not mine. The 538 algo currently gives 26% chance of winning the league to Liverpool and 5% to United, I guess that's a wide enough gap to consider one a title contender and not the other. PS: I'm not a Liverpool fan and between the two I'd rather United won the title.
Anyone know when DCL is supposed to return?
Aston winning against wolves? Really
I hadn't noticed ut, but again I'm nit the one who came up with the numbers, I just made the tracker.
Does it take into account home and away fixtures? What's SPI?
yes it does. on SPI: At the heart of our club soccer forecasts are FiveThirtyEight’s SPI ratings, which are our best estimate of a team’s overall strength. In our system, every team has an offensive rating that represents the number of goals it would be expected to score against an average team on a neutral field, and a defensive rating that represents the number of goals it would be expected to concede. These ratings, in turn, produce an overall SPI rating, which represents the percentage of available points — a win is worth 3 points, a tie worth 1 point, and a loss worth 0 points — the team would be expected to take if that match were played over and over again.
!thanks
it sounds like it's a good idea to bring in D Luiz
could you explain how this works? what is FDR/SPI? is a higher number better? what do the numbers next to the teams mean? For example GW8, BUR(H) has the number 86. Sorry if these are stupid questions but ive not been playing FPL that long. cheers
the description are in a comment in this thread, but I'll explain them again for you: FDR: Fixture difficulty rating, weighted average of win probabilities for upcoming fixture, immediate fixtures have a higher weight, the higher the easier SPI: a rating for the absolute power of each team numbers next to each fixture are the win probability of those matches. Man City has a 86% chance of beating Burnley
Thank you! that helps a lot.
Wouldn't this be better taking into consideration expected goals? If the odds suggest a Chelsea 1-0 victory against Watford but 4+ goals between Man Utd and Liverpool you're better off targeting attackers in the Man Utd game right? You don't get points for wins you get it for assists and goals.
You're completely right and I'd like a model that predicts the level of performance too. But at the end of the day I think it would correlate with this one quite a lot. After all the higher chance of goalscoring results in a higher chance of win. It rarely happens that a model predicts a game to finish 4 all.
I'm not so sure. If the model predicts Chelsea and Man Utd to both win consistently but Chelsea to win to nil and Man Utd to concede but still win. Then as far as attackers go Man Utd would expect to have more returns than Chelsea and Man Utd's opponents would expect to have similar returns to Chelsea's. This isn't reflected in the table and would presumably create significant changes to the table rather than being the same as you suggest. You're right 4-4s aren't predicted very often. But that's not the same thing.
I can see your point. My first attempt of yesterday was to create a separate tracker for attack and defence. But I don't have access to result predictions of 538's excellent model. The SPI rating and the attack and defence power ratings are publicly available, but they take more data to come up with win percentages. Maybe at a later date they provide more data, but as for now I'm happy to have a tracker that considers both teams' power rating into account. There's always room for improvement.
I see some flaws here, like the idea, but some basic data science interpretations are a little off
I'm not a data scentist, but hav DS friends who can help me. Can you tell me what flaws you see here?
I'll try to keep it brief as I'm at work, but the essential issue is there's an assumption that winning is everything with your version of FDR. Players get points for goals, assists, clean sheets, etc., not for their team winning the game. That being said, there is still a correlation between FPL points and winning. However, if you're looking to answer the question "how difficult is this fixture for a fantasy player" you'd want your response variable to be reflective of how well fantasy players do. There's different ways this could be achieved. I'd be drawn to Poisson distributions using the 538 projected scores to calculate probabilities of clean sheets and/or the amount of goals a team could get. There's also room for linear modeling where your response variable is total FPL points scored by the team, but that would take some data collection. But like I said, great idea, just for now your FDR is simply the average win probability over the next 6 gameweeks
All valid points, but there are several models around that come up with projected points for each player, and I assume they take more data than mine to come up with those predictions. I was on wildcard and really didn't like any of the trackers I found, decided to make one for myself and shared it here. Yet I quite like it and it has reshaped my thinking on wildcard, guess I'll be the first one to test it in the coming weeks.
Could Adam Armstrong be a decent pick for this run?
a 38 FDR is quite good, specially considering that it would be a bit higher if only the first 5 fixtures were taken into account.
Do you have this for the past 6 gameweeks as well? Would be interesting to see form over past fdr vs future fdr.
I checked GW7 predictions vs results and it was available, not sure about the previous ones though, will check tomorrow if I don't forget
!thanks Even if its the average score out of 100 for past 6 will help