Euro 2008 Prediction Competition

[Locutus]

Originally posted by McMeadows
I had different expectations on still being able to join the game after those games were played.

My apologies, I can understand that comes as a nasty surprise. But you no matter how you look at it, you had a major advantage by making those predictions later (e.g. many, myself included, predicted the Czechs to win the group but after their first match I think most of us wished we hadn't; similarly, I'm pretty sure many of us expected Turkey to suck balls and finish dead last, the first game was a bit of an eye opener there as well, even if they lost it). If I'd allow you to make those predictions after the first games had already been played I'd have to allow everyone to do so. And then where do we draw the line, at what point do we set the deadline? It's only a 3-match schedule, that's too short a time to allow changes after the first game...

I did change the rules to allow late predictions for group winners/champion/top scorers for teams that had not played yet, but once a team has had it's opening match it's just too late. If you misunderstood that that was the rule, my apologies, I should've explained that more clearly.

Originally posted by Ecthy
14? I can see how I get 2+2 for yesterday's games plus 2+2 for the top 2 teams in group B. Makes 8. Where do the other 6 come from?

You get 5+5 for the top 2 teams -- you were one of the very few to correctly predict Croatia would be first, Germany second, that's worth 5 points each. 2 points for group winners is what you get for predicting the right teams but in the wrong order.

[Ecthy]

I was under the impression I had guessed Germany as a group winner. That's cool

[Ecthy]

Funny how so many people have less than 50% correct outcomes. Even a randomized machine would guess 50%

[Locutus]

You're forgetting about draws And as the percentage of draws can vary widely from one tournament to the next, it's not easy to say how well a random number generator would do -- but going by snoopy's results I'd say slightly under 30%

[Locutus]

Originally posted by LordShiva
I'd rather watch this Austria-Germany game

Just this once I'll pretend I didn't see that

If you want to watch something similar that doesn't break Apolyton's rules: http://www.youtube.com/results?searc...tegory=0&page=

And if you move to the Netherlands you can watch that during half-time of every match, in HD

[Solver]

Given van Basten's announced lineup for today's match, I am changing my prediction to

Holland - Romania 2-1

[Locutus]

He did?

[Solver]

He did.

[LordShiva]

I will also change to Netehrlands-Romania 2-1

[Solver]

Copying me

[LordShiva]

Insider information

[Solver]

Official lineups are up... the Dutch are sure playing their reserve team I'll stick with 2-1 though.

[Locutus]

You expected anything else? Even after we had an elaborate discussion on this four years ago when we were on the receiving end of that? It's not like Portugal and Croatia did any different, and you can expect the same from Spain tomorrow. That's just how modern football works...

[Solver]

I expected a few more first-team players, say, van der Sar and van der Vaart.

But comparing Holland today and Portugal or Spain is completely unfair. Nothing depended on Portugal's game - it was only between Turks and Czechs. Nothing depends on tomorrow's Spanish result, it's between Russians and Swedes. And heck, the Croatians only had any meaning theoretically. Whereas today, whether the outcome of Italy - France means anything depends quite directly on the Dutch.

[Locutus]

Many of those guys are still regular starters, just not necessarily the last two games: Boulahrouz, Heitinga, De Zeeuw, Engelaar, Huntelaar, Robben, Van Persie (the last two obviously only didn't start in earlier games because of injuries). That's still 7 first-team players.

Edit: forgot De Cler, so make that 8.

And so? How's that any different from Germany vs Czech Republic 4 years ago? Might not be a fantastic situation, but everyone always does that given the opportunity, that is how the game works. It's naive to expect differently.