An interesting story from the National News Media has come to our attention.

Cardiff Met will become the first British University men’s side to play in European competition when they take on Progrès Niederkorn in Luxembourg on Thursday.

According to Christian Edwards, the former Swansea City, Nottingham Forest and Bristol Rovers defender in charge of Cardiff Met:

"Two of our players came from the professional game, one has captained Hereford at Wembley, and then you’ve got some boys who have never been at an academy in their lives – we’ve got five farmers from the west.”

We at Soccer Mad Boffins say 'good luck' to the academic footballers of Cardiff Met!


For the full article, reported by The Guardian, visit: https://www.theguardian.com/football/2019/jun/26/cardiff-metropolitan-university-europa-league


Here is a video clip and article by the BBC:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48771709

The FIFA Women's World Cup Finals Group Stage is Over - How Close Were Your Predictions?

The FIFA Women's World Cup Finals Group Stage is Over.

There have been many highs: High scoring teams, new records set, and free-flowing football.

There has been some controversy too, mainly around VAR.

And let's not forget the disappointment, even heartbreak, of the valiant Scotland team whose 3-0 lead against Argentina was unpredictably (or perhaps predictably!) cut to a 3-3 draw in the closing minutes.  Or the crying fans of Thailand who saw their team on the wrong end of thirteen goals from the USA.

It all goes to show what an exciting roller-coaster ride this tournament has been so far.

So, how close were your predictions?

Just like we did for last year's 2018 men's FIFA World Cup, here at Soccer Mad Boffins we had a go at guessing the outcome of each game, and calculated final Group standings based on the results.  We also rolled dice for a comparison to see if random chance or good old gut instinct and brain power would be better.  

Our friend and colleague Jon Fanning, also from University of York joined in the fun too.  The results make for interesting reading and can be found in the report that you can read by clicking on the link at the end of this article. 

So what are you waiting for? Download the report now and see how we compared to each other, to the dice, and how our performance at predicting France 2019 contrasted with our attempts to predict Russia 2018.  

Could you have done better?

You can read the article for free on the Researchgate website by clicking here: 

Soccer Mad Boffins FIFAWWC Group Stages Predictions Report


The DOI for the report is:

DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.24401.38248

The Women's World Cup is off!

So the FIFA Women's World Cup in France has kicked off!  Our dice prediction South Korea fared very poorly in their first match against France who proved to be too wizzy for them.  Loads to look forward too, of course, including today's big England v Scotland match.  The BBC have a useful guide to their coverage and to the tournament in general here which might be useful!

So bookmark that link and get ready for some more soccer mad antics!