This page explains where the numbers on Correct Score Predict come from, how our own statistics are calculated, and what they cannot tell you.
The prediction tables
The table at the top of each prediction page is supplied by an external football data feed and refreshes automatically. For each fixture it shows three percentages for a home win, a draw and an away win, the likeliest of the three, a predicted score and an average goals figure. We publish the table as it arrives and do not alter its numbers.
The predicted score in tables like this normally comes from a standard statistical model that turns each team’s expected goals into a probability for every possible score. Our expert prediction page explains that model and tests it against real results.
Our own statistics
The guides below each table are built from public match records. For Europe’s main leagues we use the results archive at football-data.co.uk, which records the score, the half-time score and the closing bookmaker prices for every match. For European club competitions and some leagues outside Europe we use the open match records published by the openfootball project, and season summaries where match-by-match records are not available.
Three calculations appear across the site:
- Shares of results. Counting how often each score, result or goal total occurred, for example the share of matches finishing 1-1.
- Ratings from prices. Turning closing bookmaker prices into probabilities and removing the bookmaker’s margin, so that a team’s rating can be compared with how often teams at that rating won.
- Probabilities from expected goals. Converting an average goals figure into the chance of a given outcome, such as three or more goals. Before using this, we checked it against real over 2.5 rates in 13 leagues; it matched each one to within two percentage points.
Each page states the competitions, the seasons and the number of matches behind its figures, and the most recent five complete seasons are used unless a page says otherwise.
Checking facts
Champions, points totals, records and finals are checked against at least one independent source before they are published. Where a source and our own calculation disagree, we look for the reason. For example, some leagues break ties on head-to-head results rather than goal difference, which changes the order of clubs level on points, and some leagues use play-off rounds that make simple tables misleading. In those cases we publish the official outcome, not our calculation.
Limits
Five seasons of results are a solid base, but not a guarantee about the next match. Team news, injuries and the weather change individual games in ways that no historical average captures. Small samples, such as a single season in a league with few matches, are labelled as such and should be read loosely. And every percentage on the site is a probability: a 60% chance fails four times in ten.