A busy week for me, and a bit of a graveyard for rugby this weekend, as the Premiership takes a break ahead of the November Internationals, with only the Premiership and a few bits of silliness to keep us going (Australia and the Baabaas, US and the All Blacks), so another short post. Pro 12 predictions as follows:
Home win |
Draw |
Away win |
||
| Glasgow | 89% | 5% | 6% | Benetton Treviso |
| Leinster | 94% | 1% | 4% | Edinburgh |
| Ospreys | 87% | 2% | 10% | Connacht |
| Cardiff Blues | 37% | 2% | 61% | Munster |
| Scarlets | 94% | 1% | 4% | Zebre |
| Ulster | 93% | 3% | 4% | Dragons |
A quick word about international predictions. I’m finding these a good bit harder for a couple of reasons, but the main one seems to be the gulf in standard in competitions is so much broader than between the Top 14, Pro 12 and Premiership. Australia might not have a great win record – but that’s at least partly because they play NZ and SA so much! Likewise, the model doesn’t quite seem to grasp just how all-conquering the All Blacks are. As a example, I fired it up to predict this weekend’s USA-NZ game and the home team were given an 8% chance of winning. Surely of all the games I’ve predicted so far, this is the most obvious, yet it’s telling me the US have a better chance against the All Blacks than Edinburgh did against Munster at the start of the season? Something to work on for next week…