Long - Time to go.

[Snowball]

I would agree brendy/RR if, and that's a big IF, he didn't throw them out there as the definitive truth and of greater significance than how the game is actually played out in front of your eyes.

Because, Brendy, Snowball goes to a game carrying a lap-top and takes copious notes.
Because, Brendy, Snowball completely lacks passion for the game, and never gets aroused or raises his voice, or wants a ref hung.


Hoop, you seem to think the eyeball method is a good one. It IS NOT. It is one of the worst judgment methods there are. Recently Dellor talked about how at Barnsley (last season) we were SLAUGHTERED for 25 minutes and should have been 3-0 down, but they didn't score. They faded, we scored and eventually stole the game. What should have been a 4-0 defeat became a 3-1 win.

In the post-match interview, Rodgers spoke of how READING controlled the first 25 minutes. Dellor was flabbergasted. How could a professional manager be SO wrong? Rodgers is CLEARLY a good manager (Swansea are 3rd in the table) and analyses in detail. HOW could he not see it?

Weeks later, after reviewing the match footage, Rodgers admitted he was WRONG and we WERE hammered for 25 minutes. He put his error down to "passion" and being influenced by the eventual result.

POINT? Humans are extremely fallible. They get it wrong almost ALL of the time.


Jeez, I was going to do my PhD on exactly that subject. ERRORS IN HUMAN INFERENCE




Another example. Most businessmen "SWEAR BY" the interview. it's "the best way of assessing a prospective employee." THOUSANDS of studies have confirmed that this is by far the standard view. And yet countless studies have show the interview to be THE WEAKEST assessment method there is. Questionnaires, exams, and various "blind" assessments have been shown IN EVERY CASE to be far superior. So what do we keep doing? INTERVIEWING! Because that's what our gut says we should do.

Absolutely, stats can highlight a few things of interest. But they don't get close to being able to measure ability or a players worth yet people like snowball don't seem to be able to grasp that.

Hoop, do you seriously imagine that I watch Kebe and think, ah-hah, a 19.6425 meter dribble with 2.348 players defending at 86.7% efficiency, humidty 68%? No I just think "f-cking magic!!" just like any other fan. And just like any other fan there is a cumulative, gut-inspired, only partly cognitive "filtering of statistics".

By that I mean EVERY fan uses statistics ALL the time. They just don't call it that.


If a winger goes on a hundred mazy runs and fails to cross or score 100 times, we start to say, "useless, no end product."

And HOW do we get the right to say, "No end product"? Because we have "counted" the failures to cross, failures to pass to a team-mate, failures to shoot and failures to score.

That is STATISTICAL ANALYSIS.

Just as currently RFC fans are "statistically analysing" Shane Long's alleged effectiveness. They are saying 13 starts, 2 goals, 1 in 6.5 starts, not good. THEN they are analysing DEEPER and saying, "Not onl that he's not scoring in open play.... 13 games, zero open play goals..."

That's STATISTICS!!!

But what they are NOT doing is analysing the rest of the stuff.

1. How many penalties won?

2. How many attacking free kicks won?

3. How many direct assists?

4. How many brilliant flick-ons to players in space, some of which should have been goals?

5. How many defenders yellow-carded?

6. How many defenders RED-carded?

7. How many passes attempted, what percentage successful?

8. How many "lost-causes" chased down and possession won?

9. How many clearances blocked, or defender-passing-moves thwarted?

10. How many times has the player been directly involved (assist) or semi-directly involved in an RFC goal (eg Gylfi's Leicester goal)

11 After that there are the intangibles, like wearing down defenders, injuring defenders who have to go off etc, or being a threat to allow other players a little more time.

[Snowball]

Edit: I realise I told him he can't read too, but tbf he did have 4 failed attempts at reading Diego Forlan's career goals from his Wiki page.

No, ALL that happened was I read THIS


Senior career*
Years Team Apps† (Gls)†
1998–2002 Independiente 80 (21)
2002–2004 Manchester United 63 (10)
2004–2007 Villarreal 106 (54)
2007– Atlético Madrid 109 (69)
National team‡
2002– Uruguay 70 (29)


which was in LARGE print,


and didn't notice THIS


* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 21 October 2010.

which was small print.

I mistakenly presumed a summary of games and goals would be ALL games and goals. For Doyle on Wiki it is.

[Tredder]

TBF, zero goals in open play after 14 games is pretty shit, all round game or not, you're a striker and a striker is supposed to score goals, the creative midfielders and the battlers are the ones that do the rest.

Oh, and LOLz at Snowball for not finding stats for something that's going to wreck his Long time loving

[cmonurz]

I mistakenly presumed a summary of games and goals would be ALL games and goals. For Doyle on Wiki it is.

Quite hilariously, again, no it isn't. That same box on Doyle's wiki page has the same stats as Forlan. League games only. Scroll down Doyle's page and you can see his stats for all games.

[Snowball]

Snowball is great.

His manner and responses might wind otherwise pretty placid people up but his stats are, and always have been, a breath of fresh air on the Team Board.

I don't even care if they are seen as selective, skewed or otherwise inaccurate, the fact is that somebody looking at the game we love through prism specs and doing the research he does should be welcomed.

We could debate all day about how relevant his stats are or indeed how selective they are but the real problem for me is the inaccuracies

Either he's deliberately lying or he's incredibly sloppy in his research but either way I'm surprised that you of all people would welcome being mislead (deliberately or otherwise).

Frankly someone's instant honest opinion (however much i may disagree) is no less credible or welcome than a list of numbers compiled by a man who has been shown on at least 3 occasions to have got those numbers wrong. Its like Grammar Nazi's, if you're gonna wave that flag you'd better make sure you are infallible because otherwise you make yourself look a bit daft.

The irony is of course that when he's not spamming us with these selective/irrelevant/incorrect stats and actually giving his opinion I generally agree with him more than I do with most on here.

So THREE whole instances of errors (one as simple as reading Nicky Shorey's line instead of Nicky FORSTER's line, another where I used the wrong part of a spreadsheet and was reading shooting accuracy instead of goals) and I post, what, 100 stats in a week? Maybe a 1000 stats posts all told?


And do you not think I EXPECT to have my stats pored over and checked, with countless knockers EAGERLY looking for the smallest, slightest errors?

I am not a liar, never have been

[Vision]

Snowball is great.

His manner and responses might wind otherwise pretty placid people up but his stats are, and always have been, a breath of fresh air on the Team Board.

I don't even care if they are seen as selective, skewed or otherwise inaccurate, the fact is that somebody looking at the game we love through prism specs and doing the research he does should be welcomed.

We could debate all day about how relevant his stats are or indeed how selective they are but the real problem for me is the inaccuracies

Either he's deliberately lying or he's incredibly sloppy in his research but either way I'm surprised that you of all people would welcome being mislead (deliberately or otherwise).

Frankly someone's instant honest opinion (however much i may disagree) is no less credible or welcome than a list of numbers compiled by a man who has been shown on at least 3 occasions to have got those numbers wrong. Its like Grammar Nazi's, if you're gonna wave that flag you'd better make sure you are infallible because otherwise you make yourself look a bit daft.

The irony is of course that when he's not spamming us with these selective/irrelevant/incorrect stats and actually giving his opinion I generally agree with him more than I do with most on here.

So THREE whole instances of errors (one as simple as reading Nicky Shorey's line instead of Nicky FORSTER's line, another where I used the wrong part of a spreadsheet and was reading shooting accuracy instead of goals) and I post, what, 100 stats in a week? Maybe a 1000 stats posts all told?


And do you not think I EXPECT to have my stats pored over and checked, with countless knockers EAGERLY looking for the smallest, slightest errors?

I am not a liar, never have been

I've only checked 3 times beacuse my instinct and memory told me your figures were not right in those instances.

My memory >>>> your stats compiling.

Perhaps its a personal thing but you'd get cut an awful lot more slack if you weren't so condescending in your attitude and accepted (as you seem to have in the previous post) that the stats only tell part of the story and there are so many other variables.

But then I reckon you quite like the grief you get anyway

[brendywendy]

my only gripe is people are so intent on belittling them that every thread becomes an anti snowball gayfest

Precisely. Try looking carefully at how the typical thread of this type works, when the insults come in etc.

Sure I get fired up and start firing back, but in the last few days I've been told I'm out of control.
told to "go". told to shut the f--k up, LOLLed at countless times, and Hoop has formally asked for me to be banned.


NICE.

To be fair though pretty much everything Ian Royal posts gets taken to task just as much, equally Royalee gets stick,finerain, Floyd Street etc etc. I'd be willing to guess you've posted more than anyone on the team board in the last few months and an awful lot of it isnt based on opinion but a list of statistics. You cant just print them and think no-one will comment or given your track record on accuracy actually dispute them?

if you dont like them- dont read thgem, dont replyto them, and im sure youll get less of them

[Vision]

[
if you dont like them- dont read thgem, dont replyto them, and im sure youll get less of them

Slightly missing the point of a "discussion board" I'd have thought.

You're the one bemoaning the "anti-snowball" brigade, I'm merely pointing out why it appears to be that way. Besides he likes all the stick anyway I reckon.

[brendywendy]

[
if you dont like them- dont read thgem, dont replyto them, and im sure youll get less of them

Slightly missing the point of a "discussion board" I'd have thought.

You're the one bemoaning the "anti-snowball" brigade, I'm merely pointing out why it appears to be that way. Besides he likes all the stick anyway I reckon.

discussion is fine

20 threads that all descend into exactly the same gay argument is pointless.
not saying its all you lot- snowball does his fair share of ramping up the heat with his stat attacks

[Vision]

[
if you dont like them- dont read thgem, dont replyto them, and im sure youll get less of them

Slightly missing the point of a "discussion board" I'd have thought.

You're the one bemoaning the "anti-snowball" brigade, I'm merely pointing out why it appears to be that way. Besides he likes all the stick anyway I reckon.

discussion is fine

20 threads that all descend into exactly the same gay argument is pointless.
not saying its all you lot- snowball does his fair share of ramping up the heat with his stat attacks

Well oxf*rd off if you dont like it

Thats the thing though isnt it. Its the ramping up of the stats which sets it off. I only come on during work and only at the moment cos works slow but what he posted overnight on this thread was ridiculous really. He may have just made 20 posts shouting wibble wibble for all the sense and relevance it made.

That said, it doesnt really bother me. Its what happens on forums, its just a shame that it seems to have driven an awful lot of people off of this forum who heeded your advice above.
Its been an interesting season so far and there should be plenty to discuss but in my opinion its got completely bogged down in too much irrelevant number crunching.

[Snowball]

and Carlisle down 8 places (as predicted) while we are up seven places

a fifteen place turn-around


(This is where, cmonurz, Hoop etc say, "but Carlisle are not in The Championship.")

[Wycombe Royal]

its just a shame that it seems to have driven an awful lot of people off of this forum

I have found myself posting less on here purely because this forum no longer seems to be about RFC, it is just about meaningless stats and arguments about them.

This forum has gone down the pan big time and I think Graham or the mods need to do something about it before it ruins it for good.

[Tredder]

I'll liven it up on monday should we win.

[brendywendy]

awesome!

its just a shame that it seems to have driven an awful lot of people off of this forum who heeded your advice above.

this is true- i know loads who just dont bother any more- but it started well before the statmeister came on here tbf.

i believe the stern telling off we recieved in the whiff this week will sort it all out though

[Vision]

awesome!

its just a shame that it seems to have driven an awful lot of people off of this forum who heeded your advice above.

this is true- i know loads who just dont bother any more- but it started well before the statmeister came on here tbf.

i believe the stern telling off we recieved in the whiff this week will sort it all out though

Was it funny for once.?

[brendywendy]

no.

only in its po facedness

but i guess it made some valid points

[Snowball]

Just discovered that Longy was on the pitch for 14 of our 22 goals and had a hand in 8 of them

[Hoop Blah]

....this forum no longer seems to be about RFC, it is just about meaningless stats and arguments about them.

This forum has gone down the pan big time and I think Graham or the mods need to do something about it before it ruins it for good.

I agree totally with this.

I'd like to ignore snowball, but he's getting very difficult to ignore through the volume and make up of his posts, and the generally rubbish that fill them up. To an extent I think he needs to be challenged, and, having had a quiet couple of weeks at work I've done that.

Apparently I've 'formally' requested he got banned. If I knew how I would!

I think a few of us have contributed more than we'd like to in the direction the board has gone over the last few weeks as snowballs stats, the application, interpretation and presentation of them has been challenged. One thing I would say is that it's been the usually more fair minded and rational posters doing it. That must say something?

I'm back to flat out at work now and so I'm switching off the snowball stuff from now on and hoping that the board gets back to discussing football.

[Snowball]

I discuss football, Hoop.

I just don't make unsupported guestimates

[cmonurz]

An opinion is not an estimate, Snowball.