Last Man Standing

Safety score = 43

78 knocked out, 584 remain.

Congrats to all the survivors 🙂

I’m not sure why I’m writing this when it’s shelf life is a matter of days but I hope attempting to put numbers to it will help people who don’t quite get that the DGW is just a big old maybe right now and the best advice is to wait until after the FA Cup games on Sunday are all over before thinking too deeply about what to do.

Which matches might be blank in gw27 and re-arranged for a DGW at some point?

Due to the League Cup final on Sunday 28th February, these 3 matches may need re-arranging:
Liverpool vs Everton
Newcastle vs Man City
Stoke City vs Aston Villa

What are the chances of each blank happening?

As the LC Semi Finals are Liverpool vs Stoke and Everton vs Man City, if any of these teams progress to the final, their gw27 match will be a blank. Now the Liverpool vs Everton gw27 match faces double jeopardy as either Liverpool or Everton reaching the final will result in a blank so there’s some extra maths in a bit, but these are the %age likelihoods of each team reaching the LC final as going by bookies best odds† from OddsChecker.

Liverpool 87%
Stoke 13%
http://www.oddschecker.com/football/english/league-cup/liverpool-v-stoke/to-qualify

Everton 44%
Man City 56%
http://www.oddschecker.com/football/english/league-cup/man-city-v-everton/to-qualify

So
Newcastle vs Man City has a 56% likelihood of being a blank gw27.
Stoke City vs Aston Villa has a 13% likelihood of being a blank gw27.
And for Liverpool and Everton the likelihood of either making the final is
87% + (13% x 44%) = 93% likelihood of being a blank gw27.

This is all well and good but when will these matches be re-arranged to?

Assuming the Premier League stick to UEFA rules in a bid to avoid fines, they will not re-arrange fixtures to European fixture nights and assuming they will not make teams play league games on Saturday then Monday†† on a European week then the possible weeks are for re-arrangement are gw25, gw26, g34 and gw37.

Given the FA Cup 5th Round replays, QFs and Semi Finals are all liable to causing extra double gameweeks down the line, if gw25 is available and gw26 is not available I’m pretty sure they take gw25.

For gw25 to be available, both teams in the match need to avoid a 4th round replay. I’m almost certain February 9th/10th will be the replay dates as they are the obvious free dates, replays are arranged “as directed by the FA” and this date is decided before the 4th round matches have even been decided as teams must make sure “replay tickets are in the possession of the club playing away …… immediately on conclusion of the original match.”
http://www.thefa.com/~/media/files/pdf/fa%20competitions%202015-16/competitions%20pdfs/fa-cup-rules-2015-2016.ashx?la=en

There are no PL rules on fixture re-arranging beyond the home team may suggest a date and the PL Board needs to accept the suggestion for it to be allowed pending police approval. There is no minimum time frame beyond set out in the rules beyond what police forces might disapprove of. With 10 days between 4th round matches and the available gw25 I think this is enough turnaround time for the Premier League.
http://www.premierleague.com/content/dam/premierleague/site-content/News/publications/handbooks/premier-league-handbook-2015-16.pdf

However if gw26 is available, it means that the teams are out of the FA Cup and by association that gw25, gw34 and gw37 are available and things are up in the air as there will be 4 possible dates for it to fall on.

What are the chances of the teams going out of the FA Cup this weekend?

Using OddsChecker best odds, the likelihood of each team being out of the FA Cup by the end of this weekend are: Liverpool 17%, Everton 11%, Man City 18%, Newcastle 100% (already out of the FA Cup), Stoke 40%, Aston Villa 58%
http://www.oddschecker.com/football/english/fa-cup

So for each match the likelihood of gw25, gw26, gw30 and gw34 all being immediately available are:
Liverpool vs Everton 17% x 11% = 2%
Newcastle vs Man City 100% x 18% = 18%
Stoke City vs Aston Villa 40% x 58% = 23%

What are the chances of gw25 being available and at least one of the teams qualified?

The odds against a draw for each team are:
Liverpool 76%, Everton 81%, Man City 78%, Newcastle 100% (already out of the FA Cup), Stoke 73%, Aston Villa 78%

So for each match the likelihood of gw25 being available are:
Liverpool vs Everton 76% x 81% = 62%
Newcastle vs Man City 78% x 100% = 78%
Stoke City vs Aston Villa 73% x 78% = 57%

To get the likelihood that gw25 is available and at least one of the teams qualified, we can take away the likelihood that neither team qualified from the above numbers.

So for each match the likelihood of gw25 being available and gw26 unavailable are:
Liverpool vs Everton 62% - 2% = 60%
Newcastle vs Man City 78% - 18% = 60%
Stoke City vs Aston Villa 57% - 23% = 34%

What's the likelihood of each dgw happening in each slot given the above?

Earlier I said “if gw25 is available and gw26 is not available I’m pretty sure they take gw25.” To put numbers on it I’ll say in this situation I split my confidence like so:

DGW25: 80%
DGW26: 0% (The quote is framed to give this 0%)
DGW34: 10%
DGW37: 10%

**Obviously this is just my opinion but feel free to input your own %ages here given the information I’ve laid out about re-scheduling rules and any other information you can bring to the table, heck I’ll change my own %ages too if you can bring new information to the table**

If gw25, gw26, gw34 and gw37 are all available, I think Man City and Liverpool will push for a later date as they have European games 4 days later. So for this I am inclined to move my chips towards one of the two later dates while this is not an issue for the Stoke vs Aston Villa game. I’m also inclined to reduce the likelihood of gw25 being the dgw taken when they have more time to re-arrange. Again to put %ages on it I’ll split my confidence like so

Everton vs Liverpool & Newcastle vs Man City:
DGW25: 5%
DGW26: 15%
DGW34: 40%
DGW37: 40%

Stoke City vs Aston Villa:
DGW25: 10%
DGW26: 30%
DGW34: 30%
DGW37: 30%

**Again these are just my feelings on the situation, feel free to disagree**

If gw25 is not available, then gw26 is not available immediately so I’ll split the probabilities of dgw34 and 37 as 50/50 for now.

So what does my overall picture look like for each potential DGW?
Liverpool vs Everton
No DGW: 100% - 93% = 7%
DGW25: 93% x [(60% x 80%) + (2% x 5%)] = 44.8%
DGW26: 93% x [ (2% x 15%)] = 0.2%
DGW34: 93% x [ (60% x 10%) + (2% x 40%) + (38% x 50%)] = 24%
DGW37: 93% x [ (60% x 10%) + (2% x 40%) + (38% x 50%)] = 24%

Newcastle vs Man City
No DGW: 100% -56% = 44%
DGW25: 56% x [(60% x 80%) + (18% x 5%)] = 27%
DGW26: 56% x [ (18% x 15%)] = 1%
DGW34: 56% x [ (60% x 10%) + (18% x 40%) + (22% x 50%)] = 14%
DGW37: 56% x [ (60% x 10%) + (18% x 40%) + (22% x 50%)] =14%

Stoke City vs Aston Villa
No DGW: 100% – 13% = 87%
DGW25: 13% x [(34% x 80%) + (23% x 10%)] = 4%
DGW26: 13% x [ (23% x 30%)] = 1%
DGW34: 13% x [ (34% x 10%) + (23% x 30%) + (43% x 50%)] = 4%
DGW37: 13% x [ (34% x 10%) + (23% x 30%) + (43% x 50%)] =4%

As you can see if these DGWs look to happen, I pretty much see it as evens whether they’ll happen before or after the blank. Sit tight, hold your FTs and wait and hope for definitive news before the next deadline.

† You can argue percentage points here or there but this is a discussion I’ve had too many times, bookies are good enough first predictors of markets you don’t know more about.

†† If anyone can find me precedent for this, it brings down a major assumption and I’ll happily scrap all my postulating, give a big shrug and go back to the “We just don’t know yet” stance.