By Paul Gardner
Mark Lawrenson was once a top defender. He played for the Republic of Ireland, even though he was born and grew up in England. And he had a seven-year stint with Liverpool. Which puts him up there among the stars, at least in British eyes.
These days his title is "BBC Football Expert." He does a lot of TV work for the BBC -- and comes over attractively, excellent voice, plenty of personality and humor ... and knowledgeable.
Though that last item might be questioned. Recently, Lawrenson -- he's known as Lawro -- always the good sport, affably agreed to pit his game-forecasting skills against those of a computer called SAM. Lawro lost the test of skills, rather badly.
I'll come to the gory details in a moment. For now, let's take a look at what impels soccer people to announce, loudly, that they already know the result of tomorrow's game, and maybe are confident enough to back their forecast with money.
Now surely, surely, if there's one thing that ought to be understood among all soccer fans, it is that predicting results, never mind scorelines, is a mug's game. Big time.
It is the massive unlikelihood of correctly forecasting a soccer scoreline that makes the sport an ideal activity for gambling. Just so long as you happen to be a bookie, that is.
Yet forecasting has enormous appeal. I would guess that 50%, probably more, of that appeal comes from the link with gambling, which seems to be an unstoppably popular pastime. Forecasting is the very basis of gambling.
The other 50% is free of any charge of wanting to get rich quick. For many, forecasting is simply a way of showing off, of proving that they know soccer by getting the results right. (It needs pointing out, though, that we hear a lot about these predictions when they turn out to be correct -- and not nearly so much when, much more frequently, they are wrong).
Neither motivation -- not gambling nor showing off -- stands up to a close look. Whichever one stirs you to make predictions, they are more likely to be wrong than correct. So why bother? Well, it's fun, that's why.
Of course there is professional gambling on soccer, which evidently involves nasty gangs and bribes and attempts at game-fixing, but I'm taking that to be only a small part of the whole picture. Most of the gambling on soccer is small-time stuff -- what the English call "having a flutter" -- and is pretty harmless.
Maybe not quite so harmless for experts though? Getting shown up by a computer cannot be good news for Lawro, or any of the host of pundits.
This is how it played out: of the 10 Premier League games on Boxing Day, Lawro got the results of five -- just half of them -- correct. Which gave him 50 points, plus an extra 30 points, because he also got the correct scoreline for one of those games. A total of 80 points.
Meanwhile, SAM the computer called seven of the games accurately, for 70 points, and got the scoreline correct in two of those games, for an extra 60 points. Final score: Pundit Lawro 80, Computer SAM 130. SAM by a knockout, I'd say.
Maybe Lawro is simply going through a bad patch, failing to interpret his undoubted knowledge correctly. I rather doubt that. I think what the results show is that soccer is a mightily unpredictable activity. It doesn't matter how clever and knowledgeable you are, your predictions are not going to be any better than those of ignoramuses who clumsily stick pins into the game schedule.
The week before Lawro was trounced by the computer, he had taken on Justin Moorhouse -- a comedian, well known in England because of his role in a popular sitcom. Do I need to tell you that the comedian beat Lawro, 70 to 50?
I've always quite enjoyed watching Lawro, and I genuinely applaud his willingness put his expertise on the line ... but he does seem to be contributing rather powerfully to the demise of pundits. Or at least, using ex-players as pundits.
I have no idea what sort of information was pumped into SAM, but whatever it was, it can be repeated, and refined, for any game and may well therefore stand a good chance of propelling SAM to become the very first Grand Master of Soccer Punditry. Except that the title should go to the human behind the scenes. An academic -- Ian McHale, professor of sports analytics at the University of Salford.
And of course I hate having to say all that, as I am a confirmed Luddite when it comes to the use of computers in soccer. But by flooring the likable Lawro, Professor McHale and comedian Justin have combined to make a fairly convincing case for computer SAM. More than that. They have strengthened the fear of most soccer pundits (now that's a group that I belong to, or certainly aspire to) that their predictions, maybe even their opinions, carry no more weight than a fan's boozy boast in a pub. Oh dear. What are things coming to?
