The Premier League returns tonight behind closed doors, in empty stadiums. This experiment begins with Aston Villa at home to Sheffield Utd. We have adjusted our forecasts to account for the loss of home advantage when teams play without their home supporters (see here & here). After doing so, Sheffield Utd have a 49% chance of the win, up from 42% without any adjustment. The likely scoreline is a 0-1 away win. Our unadjusted forecasts are closer to the average bookmaker odds-implied probabilities. Perhaps they haven’t been watching what has happened around Europe when matches returned without fans…
The other match tonight is Manchester City at home to Arsenal. The adjusted forecasts give City a 52% chance of a win. This is quite a big difference from the bookmakers, who generally give them over a 70% chance of winning. Perhaps they are factoring in the new substitutes rules and City’s squad depth.
The tables below give the Model’s forecasts for the upcoming matches in Round 28 of the Premier League, along with forecast probabilities estimated from current online bookmaker odds. The first table adjusts forecasts for the effect of playing behind closed doors on home advantage.
- Expected Goals: the forecast average number of goals the Model expects for Home and Away teams
- Outcome Probs: the model predicted % chance of either a Home or Away win, with 100 minus these two numbers being the % chance of a draw.
- Score Picks: the Most likely forecast scoreline outcome, as well as the most likely conditional on the most likely result outcome happening.
- Home wins / Draws / Away wins: the predicted % chance of various potential scoreline outcomes of the match.
- Mean odds: Estimates of online bookmakers’ average probabbility forecasts for the Home and Away teams to win, which could be compared with Outcome Probs.