Track record

How accurate is the model?

Anyone can say a team has a 70% chance. The honest test is what happens next: do teams given a 70% chance really win about seven times in ten? Here is the one number that answers that — and then every place you can check our working.

Graded against results you already know

When this model says a team has a 70% chance, that is about how often it happens. We tested it on every one of 987 matches at 24 past tournaments (2014–2024) — each one graded by the model rebuilt as it stood the day before kickoff, so it never saw the result — and its stated chances landed within about 5.6 percentage points of what actually happened.

Put as a single number: on average it rated the result that actually happened about 35% more likely than a blind 1-in-3 guess would.

For the statistically minded, that is a 0.572 against the 0.667 a blind guess scores — lower is better. It is the honest yardstick for 2026, not a number flattered after the fact.

See the full scoreboard — by tournament, by confidence band, with reliability diagrams →

Check the working

Five ways the model is held to account — the evidence, the failures, and the versioned record behind every number.

Prediction integrity

Locked before kickoff

Every match forecast locks a few hours before kickoff. The locked probabilities are the final prediction the model is graded against. Once frozen, the numbers cannot change, so the calibration scores on this page reflect what was actually published before each match.

Every figure on this page is the model's own calibration — its predicted probabilities compared to what actually happened on the pitch. Tap any underlined abbreviation for its definition.

How accurate is the model? · onthepitch