What will strengthen the football national team?

by Rémi Jacquaint

In the 2018 FIFA World Cup held from June 14, 2018, Germany, which was a part of the group winner in the group stage, lost, and even the strongest countries such as Spain, Argentina and Portugal lost one after another in the first round of the finals The continuation of awake. The economic newspaper The Economist is analyzing statistical data etc. about economic newspaper about what "will strengthen national football team representative of the country" who thinks about watching the World Cup?

What makes a country good at football? - The World Cup
https://www.economist.com/international/2018/06/09/what-makes-a-country-good-at-football

On a sunny afternoon on Saturday, the Uruguay national team of football is the home of Estadio Centenario, home from home, children aged 7 to 14 are supposed to be supported by their parents and participate in a nationwide project called "Baby Football" I will. Baby Football is one of the weekly football training programs, and graduates of this project have Lewis Suarez and Edison Cobni who are active in the world.

The amazing secret of 'Baby Football' - YouTube


In the 2018 FIFA World Cup held in Russia from 14th June 2017, he belonged to Group A of the same group as Russia of the host country, decided to break through top three in all three wins, and in the first round of the finals, Cristiano Ronaldo Uruguay is the only representative who has just decided to advance to Portugal national team led by 2: 1. Uruguay is the champion of the World Cup 1st tournament, but the population is only 3.44 million, less than the population of Germany / Berlin, Shizuoka prefecture (3.7 million people) , the 10th most popular prefecture in Japan, It is slightly less. Still, there are only three countries in Brazil, Germany and Italy that have won more than Uruguay in the World Cup. The Uruguayan team won the World Cup championship dates back to 1930 and 1950 at the 1st tournament, but nevertheless in 2010 it will advance to the best 4 in the world cup and decide the South America No. 1 2011 in Copa America So we are decorating the victory.

by Fauzan Saari

While Uruguay, a small country with a population of only 3.4 million people, has had great success in the football community, what is the result of a large population and economically rich country? In 2050 the country has put a lot of money in order to soccer superpower there in the China, it is Xi Jinping Jintao're led to this. However, it is not flattering that the strengthening of football that China is working as a national policy over the past few years is progressing as expected.

Countries with abundant oil money, such as the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, have invested billions of dollars to acquire European clubs. For example, Manchester City belonging to the English Premier League will invest 200 million pounds (about 400 at that rate) to the investment company of Shake Mansour Bin Zayid Al Nahyan, the royal family of the United Arab Emirates in 2008 billion) in acquisitions has been, Paris Saint-Germain, which belongs to the French Ligue 1 in 2011 in Qatar of millionaire Nasser al-Heraifi Mr. owner by Qatar investment Authority has acquired 70% of shares I am in office . It is clear that they are trying to return various know-how relating to football to their national football culture through the acquisition of a strong team, but the United Arab Emirates and Qatar could not participate in the main battle in the 2018 World Cup in both countries .

Saudi Arabia is also trying to strengthen national football by bringing nine Saudi Arabian-born players to the Spanish league at a stroke as part of a partnership with the Spanish Football Federation, but in the 2018 World Cup who participated, it won 1 wins and 2 losses I have finished in the group league losing out.

by Dan Gold

The British economic newspaper The Economist independently built a statistical model to investigate "What strengthens the national football team that represents the country?" The reason for creating the statistical model is not to "predict the winning country of the Russian World Cup", but to "find the sports and economic factors that form the basis for determining the possibility of the football national team". In other words, we created a statistical model to clarify the reasons for some countries to make a leap forward as a dark horse and to clarify the reasons for rapid improvement. The Economist has analyzed all the results of international matches that took place since 1990 and is investigating what kind of variables are influencing the performance of the national team.

Stephen Simimsky, an economist at the University of Michigan who was building a model very similar to the statistical model built by The Economist, says football tends to be more sporty in wealthy countries. Also, in poor countries "There are only 3 turf pitches in the country", so in order to investigate whether the difference between rich and poor affects the strength of the national team, The Economist is a statistical model It seems that GDP is included in one of the variables.

Besides, in order to evaluate the popularity degree of football in each country, "How much soccer-related things were searched on Google compared to sports other than soccer such as rugby and cricket from 2004 to 2018 ? "Has also been investigated. In Africa football attention is 90%, while 20% in the United States, 10% in South Asia where cricket is popular and highly popular. In addition, the "number of Olympic medals won per person" is also used as a variable to measure enthusiasm for sports in the whole country.

In addition, the "superiority of the home team" has been analyzed, and it is revealed that the home team will be advantageous for 0.6 goals on average for each game. Also, in order to exclude countries and regions that do not need to be included in the scope of analysis of the Cayman Islands, Bhutan, etc., we have set up the condition "I went over 150 games after 1990" and decided the number of countries analyzed 126 It seems that it focused on countries.

by Carlos Muza

The statistical model can explain the variance of the average goals per team by 40%. Still there are many outliers, so it seems I could not create a statistical model to predict soccer perfectly. The following graph shows the average goal number (minus the number of score points from the number of points scored) as a result of analyzing the game from 1990 to 2018 on the vertical axis, and a numerical value of 0 or more appears The team shows that there are more scores than losses in one game average. And the horizontal axis shows the forecasted value that the statistical model of The Economist bounced based on various variables "The average number of goals per game will be about this". For example, Brazilian "2" has the largest number of goals per game, but it was Germany that predicted that the statistical model had the highest average goal number.

What is positioned above the straight line running obliquely upward on the graph to the right is "a country that records a higher average goal number than predicted by the statistical model", and the one located below is "prediction of the statistical model Countries that have recorded lower average goals ". In other words, countries in China and the Middle East, which are above the straight line, are predicted to be sadly already outperforming the potential.

And one of the most attractive discoveries by the statistical model is that "a lot of things that influence the success of the national football team are not levels that can be controlled directly by the Football Federation." For example, in Africa, poverty is considered to pull the football strengthening foot, but it is impossible for the Football Federation to do this. And in Asia it seems that the low interest degree of interest is pulling the foot of football strengthening, but this is not something that can dramatically improve in a short time.

Still, The Economist wrote that "A country with a dream of winning the World Cup can learn four things from outliers and improvements of the statistical model." The four points raised by The Economist are as follows.

◆ 1: Promoting creative development for children <br> In the case of Uruguay as an example, it is important that "as many kids as possible kick the ball and extend skills". However, if you practice a lot of exercises you will not get results. Indeed, despite the eastern Germans performing a lot of exercises at that time Germany, which was known to the east and west, West Germany got excellent results at international convention.

In other words, it is important not only to kick the ball but also to make children play happily and creatively with the ball happily. Indeed, there are many soccer players who polished techniques with soccer to do with balls made by rolling socks etc. in poor slums. Football and football on the street are also perfect for honing techniques, old from Pele and Diego Maradona, Latin American-style with excellent skills such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi, Neymar, Andres Iniesta The players have refined their skills like that. Indeed, according to the data surveyed of the excellent soccer player's past, it has been revealed that excellent players had been kicking the ball while being aged between 6 and 10 years old, contrary to the dream for professionals It has been found that many of the players who were discontinued spent more time on playing football, not playing football, as football as learning.

Opportunities like "to play soccer while becoming muddy" are gradually being lost in rich countries. According to Matt Crocker, who is responsible for the athlete development department at the football association , parents who have children who are aiming for soccer players will answer, "I do not want children to go out for the game." Also, in many residential areas, Kanban "banned for football" stands, and the place to play more and more football is decreasing.

by Click and Boo

In Germany, together with environmental factors such as wide national land, many talented players, and the absence of football and popular sports, the German national team could be a better team than any other team I have analyzed the statistical model of The Economist. Nevertheless, the average goal number of the German national team from 1990 to 2005 was only about one third of the figures that the forecasting model had spilled.

How then did the German delegation make major improvements, there is an effort to strengthen the ground by the Federation of German Football Associations . The German Football Confederation has invested about 1 billion euros (about 130 billion yen) from 2001 to 250 soccer clubs nationwide that meet the criteria set by him. As a result, young people who play at the German soccer club at the time of writing articles are able to receive up to twice as many training as before. And it seems that training sessions are also focusing on nurturing creativity.

As a result, in 2014 Germany has achieved the fourth World Cup championship. Indeed, in the games since 2006, the German delegation said that the statistical model of The Economist nearly achieved the expectation of the average goal number that it got out. This German Football Confederation leverage into the nurturing age affects other countries, and in England the review of the youth development program was carried out, and the players were encouraged to think themselves by committing risks It seems to have come to be. As a result, England has won the U-20 (under 20) or U - 17 (under 17) world cup which took place in 2017.

◆ 2: Do not get over talented young people - As the German Football Federation noticed overlooking many talents at the training generation's generation, set up 360 regional centers and devote great power to uncover talent It is becoming. The result was excavated by German national Andre Surere, who is assisting the final goal in the second half of the extension in the 2014 World Cup Final.

In a small country, there is a feature that it is easy to establish a unified system. Therefore, Baby Football, Uraguay's development program, seems to be able to record the results of the program in the national database.

Iceland has a population of only 330,000 people, but there are 100 professional football players. This may be because there are more than 600 football coaches, including local soccer clubs. Iceland has made 154 small football fields nationwide to give all children the opportunity to play under the football coach. However, these programs may be impossible for African countries that are inferior in terms of finance.

by Ben Weber

◆ 3: Make the most of the vast global network of football <br> West Africa has made full use of the third point of utilizing the global network of sports. Western Europe is the center of the global network in football because there are many world-class soccer clubs where players can receive the best coaching. Cote d'Ivoire, which can be said to be the largest advanced football country in Africa, is sending a lot of young and talented players to the Belgian football club, although it did not have a chance with the 2018 World Cup. There are many cases where young African star candidates who fought a foothold in Belgium moved directly to England's Premier League and are active. It is just a case of making the best use of the global network in football.

In addition, the country with an independent population of 4.4 million in 1991 - Croatia is also a country that has achieved great success with the export of athletes. Since 1991, the Croatian football club has not made a good result in the UEFA Champions League , which is the best stage in Europe, but many European top clubs, Real Madrid, Barcelona, ​​Bayern München and Intel Milan In the club, Croatian players are active, and the Croatia delegates who gathered at the strong club club gathered at the 2018 World Cup have decided the best 8 extensions.

by Sam Wermut

◆ 4: Proper preparation at the time of the tournament - The last lesson is about the team that will face the World Cup. In 2014, the Ghana delegate offered 3 million dollars (about 330 million yen) bonus to avoid players' strikes. In addition, Nigeria has decided to boycott training sessions not included in team wages. In this way, it is necessary for the stage of the World Cup to successfully manage the team even outside the game, which is more time consuming than imagined.

Also, with the success of Spain, the 2010 World Cup winner country and Germany, the winning country of 2014, you can assemble the tactics of the national team based on the tactics of one soccer club, if not tactics The fact that it is a player or not added to the team, etc. is becoming more important. Team management is increasingly complicated.

In addition, there are data that the player who kicked the penalty kick (PK) in the World Cup has failed six times out of seven in the case of England national team. A video analysis of this PK shows that it seems that many of the unsuccessful players are getting afraid to kick as soon as possible, so in England I practiced to consciously slow down and kick the PK from the breeding age It is revealed that there is.

by Jannes Glas