Euro 2012 Prediction Competition

[iviehoff]

Unfortunately, the format is less fun for the players, particularly those who get on the wrong end of the random carry forward - or not - of particular scores from the first round robin.

What do you mean "random carry forward"?

 

In the second phase, you only play teams from the other section. So it is entirely logical that you keep your score against the teams you have already played, because you won't play them again. Thus a complete round robin of the remaining 18 teams is created, only playing the teams you haven't already played. Your scores against the teams no longer participating are not carried forward. This seems to me to be quite the logical thing to do.

 

Since I can't find it reported, I have calculated the carry forwards, and here they are. Note that Italy did particularly well against the stragglers, and thus its carry forward is not very impressive. This is fairly common for Italy. Monaco remain in the lead, but their lead over England in second is greatly reduced.

 

Monaco 156

England 143

Italy 135

Germany 134.5

Russia 127

Israel 122

Sweden 122

Bulgaria 121

Netherlands 117

Norway 115.5

Poland 114

Switzerland 114

France 109

Ireland 108

Turkey 106

Greece 106

Romania 103

Iceland 87

[iviehoff]

I observe that if Estonia had qualified instead of Iceland, then they would have a carry-over of 111, 24 more than Iceland. Similarly Wales would have had 107. So Iceland have benefited from their success in beating up the stragglers.

[jallerton]

What do you mean "random carry forward"?

 

In the second phase, you only play teams from the other section. So it is entirely logical that you keep your score against the teams you have already played, because you won't play them again. Thus a complete round robin of the remaining 18 teams is created, only playing the teams you haven't already played. Your scores against the teams no longer participating are not carried forward. This seems to me to be quite the logical thing to do.

 

It may seem logical, but it creates such strange scenraios.

 

Imagine that teams A, B, C and D are in the same group. The group results include the following:

 

A & B tie 15-15

A beat C 25-5

B beat D 25-1

C beat B 25-5

D beat A 25-5

C beat D 16-14

 

Teams A and B are the top 2 teams in the group (in joint first place) and qualify easily. At the end of the event, A and B are the top two teams overall. By co-incidence, they have achieved identical scores against teams E,F,G,H.I,J,K,L,M,N,O,P and Q.

 

Teams C and D are borderline qualifiers. They finish 9th and 10th in the group stage.

 

Scenario 1. C&D finish the group stage on the same number of VPs but C goes through on a split tie. Now:

 

Team A gets to carry forward 25VPs from its match against C, but nothing from its match against D.

Team B gets to carry forward 5VPs from its match against C, but nothing from its match against D.

 

So A is 20VPs ahead of B going into the final stage.

 

Scenario 2. D finishes the group stage 1 VP ahead of C, so now D is 9th and C is 10th.

 

Team A gets to carry forward 5VPs from its match against D, but nothing from its match against C.

Team B gets to carry forward 25VPs from its match against D, but nothing from its match against C.

 

So now A is suddenly 20VPs behind B going into the final stage!

 

So you could have a situation where D making an extra overtrick against an out of contention team, creates a swing of 40VPs in the relative scores of A and B in the final ranking!

 

Also, picking up on MickyB's point, B would have been better off beating D by fewer IMPS! Compared with Scenario 1, if B had beaten D 25-5 rather than 25-1, D would have progressed at the expense of C, thus increasing B's score in the final ranking by 20VPs!

[EricK]

It may seem logical, but it creates such strange scenraios.

 

Imagine that teams A, B, C and D are in the same group. The group results include the following:

 

A & B tie 15-15

A beat C 25-5

B beat D 25-1

C beat B 25-5

D beat A 25-5

C beat D 16-14

 

Teams A and B are the top 2 teams in the group (in joint first place) and qualify easily. At the end of the event, A and B are the top two teams overall. By co-incidence, they have achieved identical scores against teams E,F,G,H.I,J,K,L,M,N,O,P and Q.

 

Teams C and D are borderline qualifiers. They finish 9th and 10th in the group stage.

 

Scenario 1. C&D finish the group stage on the same number of VPs but C goes through on a split tie. Now:

 

Team A gets to carry forward 25VPs from its match against C, but nothing from its match against D.

Team B gets to carry forward 5VPs from its match against C, but nothing from its match against D.

 

So A is 20VPs ahead of B going into the final stage.

 

Scenario 2. D finishes the group stage 1 VP ahead of C, so now D is 9th and C is 10th.

 

Team A gets to carry forward 5VPs from its match against D, but nothing from its match against C.

Team B gets to carry forward 25VPs from its match against D, but nothing from its match against C.

 

So now A is suddenly 20VPs behind B going into the final stage!

 

So you could have a situation where D making an extra overtrick against an out of contention team, creates a swing of 40VPs in the relative scores of A and B in the final ranking!

 

Also, picking up on MickyB's point, B would have been better off beating D by fewer IMPS! Compared with Scenario 1, if B had beaten D 25-5 rather than 25-1, D would have progressed at the expense of C, thus increasing B's score in the final ranking by 20VPs!

But in each case, the final 18 teams have played each other once each and their final score is determined by the total VPs won against the other 17 teams. It only seems random because you are taking into account the extraneous information about how well those teams did against teams who never made the final. If there had been some entirely separate tournaments which determined who the final 18 were, and then they did a round robin, you probably wouldn't be concerned with how those people did against teams which never made the final.

[iviehoff]

In the real world, with 18 teams in the second stage, the teams that have anamalous carry-forward scenarios - like Iceland who have qualified into the second stage despite being way behind Estonia and Wales in terms of their performance against the leaders - are likely to be so far behind the leading teams as to be irrelevant.

[gnasher]

Last night I told two non-bridge-playing female friends that there was an European Championship for female players, and asked them whether it should be described as a "ladies' event" or a "women's event". They both said it shouldn't exist at all.

[MickyB]

Last night I told two non-bridge-playing female friends that there was an European Championship for female players, and asked them whether it should be described as a "ladies' event" or a "women's event". They both said it shouldn't exist at all.

 

That's unsurprising, much of the world believes that men and women are not just equal, but equivalent in most regards. We know from looking at the top players that, for whatever reason, being male is an advantage. Removing the women's event would be little different from telling the top female sprinters that they should be competing against Usain Bolt. Ok, so this is an exaggeration - it is conceivable that a woman could be the best bridge player in the world, but not that a woman could be the fastest sprinter in the world - but the general trend is still apparent.

[Zelandakh]

That's unsurprising, much of the world believes that men and women are not just equal, but equivalent. We know from looking at the top players that, for whatever reason, being male is an advantage. Removing the women's event would be little different from telling the top female sprinters that they should be competing against Usain Bolt.

Was this meant as a joke? There are many reasons why one group might perform better than another in any given activity. Gender is certainly one but I do not know of any evidence supporting the hypothesis that males have an advantage in bridge over women, any more than the hypothesis that women are better than men at netball or that african-americans are better than whites at basketball. There is good evidence that the difference between genders is significant in sprinting and physiological evidence to back it up. The comparison is seriously flawed and one I am pretty shocked to read here (if the comment was not intended to be humorous).

[MickyB]

I do not know of any evidence supporting the hypothesis that males have an advantage in bridge over women

 

Was this meant as a joke?

[gwnn]

There was a statistical paper that explained 96% of the apparent difference of top female chess players and top male chess players (notably, there is only one woman in the top 100 FIDE ratings list, but maybe Hou Yifan will join Judit) on the simple basis that there are more men playing chess than women. I don't know how well it applies to bridge. The ratio between men and women in ACBL membership is not *that* far from 50-50 I think, but the ratio between men and women who put much work in their bridge is clearly disproportional. In this case, there is a certain overlap between cause and effect, though (there are much fewer men in synchronised swimming than women and the reason is that men are genetically predisposed to be bad/clumsy in synchronised swimming).

[mgoetze]

The ratio between men and women in ACBL membership is not *that* far from 50-50 I think,

but it might also be interesting to consider the ratio between men and women under the age of 30 in the ACBL membership.

[chasetb]

I remember a while ago when I think a Dean of Harvard got into trouble for saying that on average, men are better than women at math and science, and got into a lot of crap for it. Some science magazine did an article on genetics and whatnot, and covered it. Based on CAT scans on multiple brains, women tended to be better at language and similar things because their brains had more development in the areas of the brain that were used for these things. Men tended to be better at math and science, because of blood flow and neurons that were in the corresponding parts of the brain. I can't find the article at the moment, but taking that as truth, I don't see how what's incorrect with the BROAD statement that was made by the Dean.

 

Going off on a related tangent, a later article (maybe the same one?) talked about how intelligence was mainly influenced by the X chromosome. Because men have only one and women have two, they were a lot more likely then women to score as geniuses. The opposite was also true - men were a lot more like than women to also be in the 'mentally retarded' category. At the time, they also didn't think that having a genius for a mom automatically assured their sons would be geniuses - it made it more likely, but it is still like a lottery pick.

 

Another article, this one written up by a female about bridge, said that men are generally better than women at bridge because of their ability to focus on bridge and ONLY bridge while at the table. Being a mom and/or a grandma made it more difficult because they would tend to multi-task and not focus solely on bridge. They would hear conversations at other tables, think about things that needed accomplished later that day or week, and so on.

 

Hopefully later, when I'm not stuck on dial-up, I can find said articles and link them, because there's nothing worse in my opinion then people who spout facts on the internet and don't (or can't) prove them.

[paulg]

Another article, this one written up by a female about bridge, said that men are generally better than women at bridge because of their ability to focus on bridge and ONLY bridge while at the table. Being a mom and/or a grandma made it more difficult because they would tend to multi-task and not focus solely on bridge. They would hear conversations at other tables, think about things that needed accomplished later that day or week, and so on.

Probably Dorothy Hayden Truscott.

 

She said something along these lines. In the days when people learned and played bridge at the kitchen table, a woman would be thinking about the chicken in the oven, picking up their child from school and whether everyone's drinks were full. A man would let the dinner burn in the oven, let the child almost drown in the pouring rain and let his guests die of thirst while playing bridge.

[paulg]

I have updated the scoring spreadsheet with the final positions for the Women Series.

 

But my focus on the competition has been destroyed by the performance of the Scottish seniors. Scotland has never won a medal at the Europeans but they lie second, 14 VPs ahead of 4th, and we'll all be rooting for them in their final match against Netherlands.

[Cyberyeti]

Since I am playing the championship I cannot participate or I might go to jail for side-betting :P

Having watched the spot fixing antics going on in cricket at the moment, I have visions of a shady bookmaker offering you a wheelbarrow full of cash for:

 

Playing a redoubled contract in the first 6 boards

Dialling a penalty of at least 800 on board 13

Going 5 down undoubled at some stage

Passing out of turn on board 7

 

Sounds a bit like the prizes at a Christmas pairs event at one of the less serious clubs I used to play at.

[Mbodell]

I remember a while ago when I think a Dean of Harvard got into trouble for saying that on average, men are better than women at math and science, and got into a lot of crap for it. Some science magazine did an article on genetics and whatnot, and covered it. Based on CAT scans on multiple brains, women tended to be better at language and similar things because their brains had more development in the areas of the brain that were used for these things. Men tended to be better at math and science, because of blood flow and neurons that were in the corresponding parts of the brain. I can't find the article at the moment, but taking that as truth, I don't see how what's incorrect with the BROAD statement that was made by the Dean.

 

Larry Summers (former Treasury Secretary under Clinton, responsible for deregulating derivatives, and then went on to be a controversial president of the University) didn't say that on average men were better. He put forward an argument that men had larger standard deviations than women on various aptitudes, and that this means that there are far more men than women at both the top end and bottom end of many fields. There is an evolutionary biology reason why you might suspect this to be the case: namely that a few very successful males can reproduce a lot (so you are willing to gamble to try for the big winner), but the variation in number and quality of offspring for a female is much less (due to pregnancy and high evolutionary cost of child bearing and rearing) so there is no reason to risk a bunch to be the top female of the species. There was also a study of high school students that backed up the claims Summers was making.

 

However, the high school study had since basically been refuted and Summers was quoting research and theories that had largely been discredited in the mainstream of their field. So then what he was left with was making a speech that is both politically insensitive/sexist and simultaneously an example of shoddy research/not being up on the field (admittedly not his field, but still). So he faced a lot of controversy from that.

[cherdano]

Was this meant as a joke?

 

Wow Micky.

 

I mean, someone who doesn't know bridge might be justified in wondering why there are many more men than women among the top players. But anyone who has been around bridge tournaments will be aware that there are many many more men than women playing bridge competitively, and with the intensity that gives them a chance to become a top player. I don't think anyone has become a top bridge players without spending a few years of his life before his mid twenties playing mostly bridge, and not too many other things, and fewer women than men make this choice.

 

But that doesn't mean that any single woman making this choice has a disadvantage in becoming a top player.

[paulg]

The competition is finished and the winner is Tomi2, three points ahead of antonylee who was two points ahead of ahh (full results). 'Wisdom of the Crowd' was ninth of thirty-three entries.

 

antonylee was two points better than anyone else in predicting the open result; bunnygo showed his complete understanding of women, scoring three points more than anyone else and the best score for any series; Tomi2 and Senior bronze-medallist John Matheson understood the senior game best - John even predicted his own third place!

[Fluffy]

zimmerman played a total 1 matches on the final stage to add to the 2 that carried over from the group phase, incredible.

[paulg]

zimmerman played a total 1 matches on the final stage to add to the 2 that carried over from the group phase, incredible.

Well planned rather than incredible. Perhaps the playing requirements (to achieve medal and points) should be changed to one third of the boards in each round-robin.

 

In events with a round-robin followed by KO stages, the WBF regulations require you to play one third of the boards in the round-robin and then one third of the boards in the KO stages: I expect the EBL is similar. The format of the Europeans, with its double round-robin, is unique so no-one really addresses it, but one third in both round-robins sounds both fair and reasonable.

 

If the ACBL or USBF were running the event, then each player would have to play half the boards in both round-robins.

[Aberlour10]

There is an announcment about The Cavendish in the last EC-Bulletin, it tooks place in Monaco this year. The " online auction " seems to be an interesting new feature. Tja, Monaco works intensively on their new role as a "bridge power".

[Mbodell]

Well planned rather than incredible. Perhaps the playing requirements (to achieve medal and points) should be changed to one third of the boards in each round-robin.

 

In events with a round-robin followed by KO stages, the WBF regulations require you to play one third of the boards in the round-robin and then one third of the boards in the KO stages: I expect the EBL is similar. The format of the Europeans, with its double round-robin, is unique so no-one really addresses it, but one third in both round-robins sounds both fair and reasonable.

 

If the ACBL or USBF were running the event, then each player would have to play half the boards in both round-robins.

 

I think the rule should be 1/3 minimum in the first RR, and then 1/3 of the counting matches in the second (so if fewer carried over you have to play more in the 2nd round).

[paulg]

I think the rule should be 1/3 minimum in the first RR, and then 1/3 of the counting matches in the second (so if fewer carried over you have to play more in the 2nd round).

I think this goes further than most would wish. Even the top teams with three professional, or non-sponsor, pairs had a weaker third pair who did not play a big role in the final round-robin. It also means the performance of the other teams affects you, which I'm not keen on. If you wanted something more draconian, then I'd aim for the US rule of 1/2 the boards in each round-robin.

[iviehoff]

Even the top teams with three professional, or non-sponsor, pairs had a weaker third pair who did not play a big role in the final round-robin.

According to the Butler scores, Fantoni-Nunes were the weak pair in the Monaco team, averaging about -0.5 a board. Zimmerman topped the Butler table.

 

Though the Butler scores are weird. England came 4th, but two pairs had negative Butler scores, and the other was only barely positive.

[Mbodell]

I think the rule should be 1/3 minimum in the first RR, and then 1/3 of the counting matches in the second (so if fewer carried over you have to play more in the 2nd round).

I think this goes further than most would wish. Even the top teams with three professional, or non-sponsor, pairs had a weaker third pair who did not play a big role in the final round-robin. It also means the performance of the other teams affects you, which I'm not keen on. If you wanted something more draconian, then I'd aim for the US rule of 1/2 the boards in each round-robin.

 

This really isn't that far. There are going to be 17 matches that count (8 of the 16 from the first round, and 9 in the second round). To demand that someone have 1/3 of them, or 6 matches, is not a tall order. In the first round there were 16 matches. To demand that someone play 6 of them is not a tall order. To be clear I'm not demanding that someone play 6+6 = 12 matches necessarily (although it could work out that way if someone only played non-qualifiers in the first round). Someone could play as few as 6 matches if all 6 of the teams they played in RR1 also advanced to the second round.

 

The purpose of having a minimum playing requirements, and of formatting the qualifier such that it is really an 18 team round robin with other matches that are more exhibition (the first round matches against non-qualifiers), work against each other unless you apply the minimum playing requirement the way I describe. There were 8 matches that didn't count towards the final standings => those 8 shouldn't count for minimum playing requirements.