Can the outcome of the international football tournaments be predicted?

Halicioglu (2005) investigated the possibility to predict the most likely winners of the Euro 2000 football tournament on the basic of the seasonal coefficient of variation (CVs) of the end-of-season points, which were computed from the top division final standings of participating countries of Euro 2000.

The CV values calculated from over ten seasons for the respective countries were used as a sole measurement value to rank the countries and to determine the most likely winners of Euro 2000.

According to the three scenarios (long-term, mid-term, and short-term) based on the respective CV values of fifteen countries, France appeared to be the most likely country to win Euro 2000 and was closely followed by Spain. The CVs are calculated as 3 categories of short term, middle term and long term. Comparing with the real FIFA results of 2000, Czech R. got the first place instead of France. The other countries of France, Spain and Germany are higher ranked in CVs. There are also getting good results in real FIFA 2000. The 5th place of Norway got low rank in CVs.

In the football matches, does the persistence in sequences exist? 在足球比赛中，是否坚持序列存在吗？

There are two researchers called Stephen Dobson and John Goddard concerning a interesting question of sports fans in 2003. In academic words, it is about the nature of persistence in sequences of consecutive match results. In non-academic words, the questions are:

(在2003年, 有两位研究者称为Dobson和约翰戈达德处理一个体育迷有趣的问题的。在学术上，它的性质是持久性的序列的连续比赛的结果。用非学术话来说，问题是：)

1. Does a sequences of wins tend to build a team's confidence and morale, increasing the probability the the next match will also be won?; or Does it tend to create pressures or breed complacency, increasing the likelihood that the next match will be drawn or lost?(难道一个胜方序列倾向于建立一个团队的信心和士气， 这增加下一场比赛也将赢了的概率？;还是会倾向于建立压力或滋生自满情绪，越来越多的可能性，下一场比赛将是失败呢？)

2. Does a sequence of losses tend to sap confidence or morale, increasing the probability of a further loss in the next match? Or does it tend to inspire greater effort, increasing the likelihood that the next match will be won or drawn?(难道一个失败序列往往会消磨其意志和士气，增加下一场比赛进一步损失的概率？还是倾向于激发更大的努力，增加下一场比赛是赢得或平手的可能性呢？)

Dobson and Goddard has analyse 30 years of match data for football from the English Premier League and Football League. They have setup an hypothesis based on a computational test of Monte Carlo analysis. The assumption behind the Monte Carlo simulation is parameter constancy and zero persistence. The result is then compared with the real results. (Dobson和戈达德用了从英超联赛和足球联赛30年的对足球比赛分析数据。他们设置一个假设的基础上计算测试 -- 蒙特卡罗分析。假设背后的蒙特卡罗模拟参数稳定性和持久性为零。然后比较其结果与实际结果。)

They got an interesting observation that the actual probability a reversal occurs is higher than the simulated probability under assumptions of no persistence. What does it mean in non-academic wordings? They summed up in the statement "Empirically, the conditional probabilities of a good result are found to decline with the duration of a poor spell, and the conditional probabilities of a poor result decline with the duration of a good spell." (他们得到了一个有趣的观察，实际发生的"反转概率"是高于在假设不持久性的条件下的模拟概率。在非学术字眼，这是什么意思？他们在声明中总结了“根据经验，一个很好的结果的条件概率是随着一个负面的时间下降的，和一个负面结果的条件概率会随着一个良好的时间下降。”)

Reference:

Dobson and Goddard (2003), "Persistence in sequences of football match results: A monte Carlo analysis", European Journal of Operational Reseaarch, 148, 247-256