Despite an extra year to prepare, this schmuck only started preparing the traditional TGIAF simulator for the upcoming European Championship the afternoon of the tournament's opener.
This (brief) article is going to give a quick overview of its predictions.
Each simulation is a single example based on weighted probability. Individually it might be fun to look at a single example (such as the one above... oh no England), but for bigger insights we often need to look at the bigger picture.
To do that we run the model multiple times - in this case 3,500 - and see what outcomes happen most often.
Who will lift the trophy?
Firstly, let's simply look at who wins the tournament over the 3,500 simulations:
Elsewhere, Denmark have been tipped by quite a few as potential dark horses, and they come out with a reasonable chance of challenging. Personally, I think the outcome is a little harsh on Portugal, who have a fearsome-looking side, and are of course the defending champions.
Knockout draw
The way the odds in the knockout rounds are calculated are using the odds to win the tournament outright, so you would expect England to finish above Belgium. The fact that they don't suggests that the way the draw unfolds is a factor.
Running the model a further 1,000 times, let's look at who the most frequent opponents for England and Belgium are if they win their groups (only including opponents that occur over 5% of the time):
England:
Second round: France 32.3%; Germany 31.8%; Portugal 28.2%; Hungary 7.6%
Quarter final: Spain 51.8%; Poland 7.2%; Sweden 6.1%
Semi final: Netherlands 19.3%; Belgium 15.4%; Italy 10.6%; Denmark 9.8%; Switzerland 5.5%
Final: Italy 17.3%; Belgium 14.4%; France 14.0%; Germany 12.9%; Portugal 8.1%
Belgium:
Second round: Poland 11.1%; France 10.9%; Portugal 10.9%; Sweden 10.3%; Germany 9.9%; Slovakia 7.9%; Wales 6.1%
Quarter final: Italy 43.3%; Ukraine 12.6%; Netherlands 12.3%; Austria 10.9%; Switzerland 8.3%; Turkey 7.1%
Semi final: France 21.1%; Germany 19.4%; Portugal 10.7%; England 10.7%; Croatia 7.3%; Spain 6.5%
Final: Spain 20.9%; England 13.4%; France 9.7%; Netherlands 9.5%; Germany 7.9%; Portugal 7.3%; Denmark 7.1%
The big, big difference is the second round outcome. England are facing a big side 92.4% of the time, Belgium only 38.4%. Honestly, it really befits England not to win their group.
How far can each team go?
To finish, we're just going to show the number of times each team in the tournament reached each stage:
Relative to their probability of winning the tournament, Sweden stand out a little as having a good chance to go deep in the tournament (8.9% chance of the semis or better), as do Turkey (11.2%).
Conclusion
Hopefully this article gives a bit of insight into the upcoming tournament, particularly how the draw will affect things. Over the weekend I am hoping to get the full simulator available - of course we will already have had some results by then!
Update: You can now access the simulator here