The CIES Football Observatory discloses its 2012/13 big-5 league predictions

For the third year running, the CIES Football Observatory has forecast the outcome of the five major European championships. A brand new model has been developed which includes four main criteria for league success: international activity of players, their league experience, squad stability and the quality of signings. This latter factor was not included in models used for the two previous seasons.

The combination of all these elements suggests that the following clubs have the best chances of finishing in the top three positions of the rankings. Clubs in bold have the highest probability of winning their respective league.

England
Manchester City, Manchester United, Arsenal

Spain
Barcelona, Real Madrid, Atlético Madrid

Germany
Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Schalke 04

Italy
Juventus, Milan,Napoli

France
Paris St-Germain, Lille, Olympique de Marseille

Our predictions also distinguish between clubs expected to finish in the first half of the league and teams expected to finish in the second part of the table. For both groups, we have identified a club per league with a high probability of performing better than expected, such as whether to finish in the top three (Chelsea, Valencia, Stuttgart, Inter Milan, and Olympique Lyonnais) or in the first half (West Bromwich, Getafe, Hamburger SV, Parma, and Lorient).

The complete predictions are available to download for free on the CIES Football Observatory website.
Week by week throughout the season, you will find on our website the updated comparison between the rank expected and actually achieved by all clubs as well as the average rank gap for each league. The best results last season were recorded in Italy and Germany (on average 3.2 ranks of difference between predictions and reality), while the worst was registered in Spain (4.3). The goal for this year is to have an average gap lower than 4 in all the leagues.

We kindly invite you to send us your questions, remarks or suggestions at [email protected]  We wish you an enjoyable season and, of course, may your favourite team perform better than we have forecasted!