Rugby World Cup 2019 predictions

[TheOvalBall]

Please for all that is good and snugly, please let Ireland beat the All Blacks. Another All Black Rugby World Cup win, will do no-one good.

 

[donmcdazzle]

Please for all that is good and snugly, please let Ireland beat the All Blacks. Another All Black Rugby World Cup win, will do no-one good.

Except for the whole country of NZ...

 

[Umaga's Witness]

Ireland
South Africa
England
Wales

Ireland is much better prepared than the all blacks who will have used their top team 5 weeks prior and Has many very inexperienced combinations. Ireland having lost to japan, and having been embarrassed (not realising that japan is actually quite good in those conditions), will have an added focus, and obviously they have used close to their top team several times in the tournament and it hasn't changed much in recent years. Plus Ireland will reveal all these moves they've been hiding.

South Africa can do what Scotland did successfully against japan, but better. Japan have emptied their physical and emotional tanks already.

England are structured, sensible, have quality players, good decision makers, and no obvious flaws. Australia are just not particularly great. They don't even know who their 10 is, and no one is playing at a world class level which they've relied on in the past. The likes of pocock and sio, Beale are having little impact. Kerevi is a hard runner to stop but makes mistakes and bad decisions on both attack and defence. If their stars stand up they could do something, but I can't see it.

France could pull off a good performance but I think wales will be able to control the game enough to win it, though this may depend on whether biggar plays

edit: scratch all that; the teams who get carded least will win

 

[Zapphod]

edit: scratch all that; the teams who get carded least will win

Sadly I expect that this is now the most likely decider.

 

[Brigantine]

Just finished watching USA vs Tonga. Now I can stop avoiding spoilers!

[link to previous full update]

It's as even as it's ever been! NZ 23%, Wales 20%, England 19%, South Africa 18%, Ireland 14%, Australia 5.5%, Japan 1.6%, France 0.2%





Pool stage league table:

1. Wales, 19 TP, +67
2. Japan, 19 TP, +53
3. England, 17 TP, +99
4. New Zealand, 16 TP, +135
5. Ireland, 16 TP, +94
6. Australia, 16 TP, +68
7. South Africa, 15 TP, +149
8. France, 15 TP, +28
9. Italy, 12 TP, +20
10. Scotland, 11 TP, +64
11. Argentina, 11 TP, +15
12. Fiji, 7 TP, +2
13. Tonga, 6 TP, -38
14. Georgia, 5 TP, -57
15. Samoa, 5 TP, -70
16. Uruguay, 4 TP, -80
17. Namibia, 2 TP, -141
18. Canada, 2 TP, -163
19. USA, 0 TP, -104
20. Russia, 0 TP, -141

If there was e.g. a huge earthquake that forced the cancellation of all remaining games, what would the outcome be?

QF1 England vs Australia

• Match Points from the Pool Phase: England 17 - 16 Australia
• England win

QF2 New Zealand vs Ireland

• Match Points from the Pool Phase: New Zealand 16 - 16 Ireland
• Points difference: New Zealand +135 - +94 Ireland
• New Zealand win

QF3 Wales vs France

• Match Points from the Pool Phase: Wales 19 - 15 France
• Wales win

QF4 Japan vs South Africa

• Match Points from the Pool Phase: Japan 19 - 15 South Africa
• Japan win

SF1 England vs New Zealand

• Match Points from the Pool Phase: England 17 - 16 New Zealand
  
• England win

SF2 Wales vs Japan

• Match Points from the Pool Phase: Wales 19 - 19 Japan
• Points difference in all tournament matches: Wales +67 - +53 Japan (as no points were scored in either QF3 or QF4)
  
• Wales win

Bronze Final New Zealand vs Japan

• Points difference in all tournament matches: New Zealand +135 - +53 Japan (as no points were scored in QFs or SFs)
  
• New Zealand win

Final England vs Wales

• Points difference in all tournament matches: England +99 - +67 Wales (as no points were scored in QFs or SFs)
  
• England win

Outcome:

1. England
2. Wales
3. New Zealand
4. Japan

On the WR Rankings - Japan is up to 7th, and will be at 6th for a day if Australia lose big to England. But unless they make the SFs, Japan will be back down to 8th or 9th depending on the margin. Before this tournament 9th was their record high.

Also noteworthy is that Italy is ahead of Georgia, and Argentina is ahead of Fiji. Flipped from the start of the tournament.
So the NH T1 WS is still better than the European T2 Champion, and the SH T1 WS is better than the Pacific T2 runner up. (but not better than Japan)
Under normal non-RWC circumstances it's difficult for Italy and Argentina to get wins and prove this in the rankings, or for Georgia, Fiji and Japan to get their rankings dominance challenged.

In the awards for Pool of Death, I'd like to nominate Pool D.
Pool D had the lowest point differentials of any pool - all teams were within +/- 80, while all other pools all had teams above +90 and below -100.
In Pool D, both teams scored tries in every game. Every other pool had 2 or 3 teams who finished a game without scoring a try.

 

[Goodey]

Oof there's a lot of red on them pie charts.

I'm surprised that your model rates Wales v France as the most certain quarter final. The bookies completely disagree.

 

[bushytop]

Oof there's a lot of red on them pie charts.

I'm surprised that your model rates Wales v France as the most certain quarter final. The bookies completely disagree.

I guess my ludicrous madness had 'some' merit after all eh Goodey?

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Brig needs to set up a patreon or something, this is way too in depth to be free

 

[Goodey]

I guess my ludicrous madness had 'some' merit after all eh Goodey?

Apparently.

Didn't I call a post of yours ludicrous about two weeks ago though? Can't have been about the QF I think

 

[bushytop]

Apparently.

Didn't I call a post of yours ludicrous about two weeks ago though? Can't have been about the QF I think

The 'madness' was that Wales 'should' be considered the biggest favourites of each of the QF's. The 'ludicrous' was that Englands group (Pool C) wasn't the Pool of Death.

Now no 'model' is 100% but @Brigantine is doing a pretty sterling job with his and both of my mad and ludicrous points are valid... as far as this model goes, hence 'some' merit to both I reckon.

 

[Cooper]

Ok, let's give this a shot!

England vs Australia - 37 - 22
ABs vs Ireland - 24 - 15
Wales vs France - 18 - 15
Japan vs South Africa - 28-40

I want to predict an upset, but it's just too hard to do!

 

[mdaclarke]

Ok, let's give this a shot!

England vs Australia - 37 - 22
ABs vs Ireland - 24 - 15
Wales vs France - 18 - 15
Japan vs South Africa - 28-40

I want to predict an upset, but it's just too hard to do!

I'd switch the scores between Wales and France but the rest look pretty accurate to me.

England vs Australia - 37 - 22
ABs vs Ireland - 24 - 15
Wales vs France - 15 - 18
Japan vs South Africa - 28-40

 

[sigesige00]

We must see:
Final: Ireland v Japan
3rd place: England v Wales

 

[Goodey]

If that happens I'll buy you a ticket.

 

[Brigantine]

Japan is out, normal programming resumes. From here on in the model can basically be quoted as "don't know"


Wales should bounce back next week and give a better performance. 3rd time lucky in the Semifinals!

The England vs New Zealand SF has been labelled the effective final ever since the draw came out, and it should live up to that in terms of quality and excitement. England have regained their #2 spot in the world rankings just in time.
The real final won't be rubber stamp though.

[EDIT: These charts were incorrect. See the correct versions here]





Stuff has:
SF1: NZ 62% England 38%
SF2: Wales 57% South Africa 43%

To win: NZ 46%, England 26%, Wales 19%, South Africa 9%

So the same but they have a little bit more confidence in the favourites.
[technically my model has Wales and South Africa as a statistical tie. Good candidate for an a.e.t. result!]

RWC 2019 places:

1. TBD
2. TBD
3. TBD
4. TBD
   
5. Japan, 19 TP, +53 [1st in Pool]
   
6. Ireland, 16 TP, +94 [2nd in Pool]
   
7. Australia, 16 TP, +68
8. France, 15 TP, +28
9. Italy, 12 TP, +20 [3rd in Pool]
   
10. Scotland, 11 TP, +64
11. Argentina, 11 TP, +15
12. Fiji, 7 TP, +2
13. Tonga, 6 TP, -38 [4th in Pool]
    
14. Georgia, 5 TP, -57
15. Samoa, 5 TP, -70
16. Namibia, 2 TP, -141 [4th in Pool]
    
17. Uruguay, 4 TP, -80 [Last in Pool]
    
18. Canada, 2 TP, -163
19. USA, 0 TP, -104
20. Russia, 0 TP, -141

 

[TRF_heineken]

Why does SA have a lesser % than Wales? Is it mostly because we lost our opening game against NZ?

Happy that we have the underdog ***le, just wondering why we got the lowest of the 4.

 

[ncurd]

Why does SA have a lesser % than Wales? Is it mostly because we lost our opening game against NZ?

Happy that we have the underdog ***le, just wondering why we got the lowest of the 4.

I think he uses the world rankings as the main basis so as your 4th below Wales it makes sense.

 

[Brigantine]

Why does SA have a lesser % than Wales? Is it mostly because we lost our opening game against NZ?

Happy that we have the underdog ***le, just wondering why we got the lowest of the 4.

Good Question. Stuff has South Africa as clear (albeit slight) underdogs, and I can't speak for them... but as for my model, looking at the RP in the box & whisker chart, South Africa is actually ahead 0.16 RP, so should be 50.8% to win.
Projections from 10,000 simulations are going to have a bit of sampling error, and since it's basically 50:50 I didn't think too much of it. But on closer inspection something didn't update properly for the RP gained in the QFs. So correcting for that, South Africa gains slightly more than Wales did because Japan is rated as a tougher opponent, and...

Your appeal to the ref was successful! So now it looks like this:





Wales vs South Africa is still close enough that the median scenario goes into extra time.

Sorry for the confusion!

As for why South Africa and Wales are so close... well their WR Rankings Points before the world cup were only 0.02 apart! These 2 teams have been 50:50 the whole way through.

 

[TRF_heineken]

Interesting.

What makes it most interesting for me is the following:

Wales are the only Semi-finalist that won all 4 their pool games.
South Africa is the only Semi-finalist that lost a game in their pool.

England and NZ both had a draw/NR for their last game.

Out of of the 4 pools, just Pool A is no longer part of the tournament.

Both Semi's have a NH and a SH team involved.

Wales and South Africa share the top try scorers with Josh Adams and Makazole Mapimpi on 5 tries.

England is the only team that haven't received any cards in the tournament. SA had 1 yellow card, NZ & Wales had 3 each.

Wales have made 647 tackles so far, followed by South Africa with 513, then England with 490, then New Zealand with 481

Wales and South Africa have scored with a drop goal in the tournament, but not England nor New Zealand.

 

[Reiser99]

England is the only team that haven't received any cards in the tournament. SA had 1 yellow card, NZ & Wales had 3 each.

That stat from a England perspective honestly shocked me.