Are World Rugby Rankings a Sham?

Investigating the system behind the rankings:

In this podcast, we take a “behind the scenes” look at the World Rugby (Union) Rankings. After much research, World Rugby claims that its adapted version of the Elo Rating system is the most effective way to predict the probability of a team winning and therefore the most accurate ranking system for Rugby Union. Stay tuned to see if this is really the case…

ALL CREDIT for this concept and hands on number crunching goes to the “numbers man” Kai Striega!

In this podcast, we take a "behind the scenes" look at the World Rugby (Union) Rankings. After much research, World Rugby claims that its adapted version of the Elo Rating system is the most effective way to predict the probability of a team winning and therefore the most accurate ranking system for Rugby Union.

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Top 10 teams and their ratings at the conception of World Rugby Rankings (2003) for a traditional Elo system, Kai’s adapted Elo system and World Rugby’s Elo system.

Top 10 teams and their ratings to date (July, 2019) of World Rugby Rankings for a traditional Elo system, Kai’s adapted Elo system and World Rugby’s Elo system.

Traditional Elo Rating system. 11% error rate at predicting a winner between teams. Heavily favors the home-field team.

World Rugby’s adapted Elo Rating system (home-field handicap, scoreline multiplier & World Cup Multiplier). 7.3% error rate at predicting a winner between teams.

Kai’s adapted Elo Rating system (home-field handicap only). 5.9% error rate at predicting a winner between teams.

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