Football Data Science

Learn data science through football. Test what football believes. Try the models yourself.

For fans, players, coaches and analysts. Every idea starts with a football question, and you don't need a maths background.

Written by Bryan McGuire, a data scientist with more than 35 years' experience, using real match data.

Start learning Myth or Maths

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I'm here for the football

Home advantage, derbies, 2–0 leads: football's favourite sayings tested against real Scottish results.

Myth or Maths

I want to learn data science

Start from a penalty and build up to machine learning, one football question at a time. No maths background needed.

I work in football

Decisions with real stakes: who to sign, who marks whom, how to rotate the squad. Try the models, or talk to me about your own data.

New on the site

Is a half-time lead worth what it looks like? Matching like with like

Sides a goal up at half-time win 70% of the time; sides level win 32%. But the sides in front were usually the better sides before kick-off. Matching each leader with level sides that were just as fancied beforehand shows what the lead itself is worth, and what matching can never fix.

Intermediate Part 7 of Cause and Effect Through Football

Better finishers, or luck? The standard error and the luck margin

Hearts scored with 34.7% of their shots on target last season and Dundee United with 28.8%. How far luck alone can move a rate like that, how to put a margin round it, and why most of the gap in finishing between clubs is luck.

Beginner Part 17 of Statistics Through Football

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Are left-footed penalty takers worse?

Left-footers are supposed to be the weaker penalty takers. Across 1,557 penalties in StatsBomb's open data, left-footed and right-footed kicks went in exactly as often: 74.2% each, and the same in shootouts.

26 October 2026 Beginner Myth or Maths

Who gets there first? Timing a pass, and the cost of waiting

A pass is a race between the ball and the nearest defender. Work out when each gets there, turn the gap into a chance, and one touch on the ball turns a switch that gets there 95% of the time into one that gets there 78%. The idea behind pitch control and the Action and Reaction board.

Intermediate Part 13 of Decision Science Through Football

This weekend

The Scottish Premiership's next fixtures, with each side's chances from the prediction board .

Wed 28 Oct, 19:45

Aberdeen v Falkirk

48% Aberdeen27% draw25% Falkirk
Wed 28 Oct, 19:45

St Mirren v Hibernian

33% St Mirren27% draw40% Hibernian
Wed 28 Oct, 19:45

St Johnstone v Motherwell

42% St Johnstone27% draw31% Motherwell

All fixtures and the full forecast