Scientists say that the days of an underestimation of the outcome of a match may be over as matches become more predictable.
Michael Regan is a photographer.
Soccer games that make you sit on the edge of your seat may be a thing of the past according to new scientific research.
Scientists analyzed 26 years of European soccer matches and found that the games have become more predictable over time. The work is in a journal.
A soccer fan and a computational social scientist, Taha Yasseri is a student at University College Dublin.
"I realized that I could use network science and network analysis methods to make predictions about the results of football matches," he said.
He built a computer model and analyzed soccer matches.
As the years went by, he found that stronger teams beat their weaker rivals more often.
Football is exciting because there is always a chance for the weaker teams to win. The fans might be taken away from the sport if money is poured into it and not regulated.
He found that the financial disparity among teams went up. He compares it to gentrification in sports.
Better teams win more games.
They buy better players and win more games.
"As a football fan, that's really hard for me to take."
Luis Miguel Echegaray thinks that the solution could be to have an independent regulator in every soccer league. He says that they can instill rules that forbid overspending on players.
When a team that began the season with 5000-to-1 odds against them won the 2016 Premier League title, Echegaray said leveling the economic playing field in European soccer could bring back the magic moments.
It's not usually what happens in a Cinderella story, that's why the story ofLeicester City was such a success.
Sports fans would want more Cinderella moments.
