Analysts predict that a formidable-looking Belgium side will lift the trophy Getty Images
Analysts predict that a formidable-looking Belgium side will lift the trophy Getty Images

Euro 2020 kicks off on June 11 in Rome with Italy taking on Turkey at the Stadio Olimpico. Two more games will be played on Friday with Wales facing Switzerland and Denmark taking on Finland. The 24-team competition was supposed to be held in 2020 but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was postponed to 2021.

Euro 2020 predictions: Goldman Sachs made use of a datasheet of 6,000 games since 1980 and historical data besides considering factors such as current form, home advantage and ELO rankings. As per the model, Kevin De Bruyne’s Belgium will win beating Italy in the final in the extra time at the Wembley Stadium.

How Goldman Sachs Picking a Winner at Euro 2020?

Goldman Sachs then simulate the tournament using our estimated scoring model (Exhibit 5 and 6 - Check the Full Text).

Goldman Sachs' key predictions are:

First, Belgium will win the Euros for the first time in history, narrowly beating Italy in extra time on July 11. The reason the model gives Belgium the edge is primarily its high Elo score, where it is ranked first amongst European nations, just behind Brazil. That said, we see a close race between Belgium, Italy, Portugal and Spain, which all make it to the semi-finals.

Second, we predict that Germany will make it out of its difficult group ahead of France, but then lose to England at Wembley during the round of 16, as Germany’s low Elo ranking more than outweighs its positive tournament effect. (Speaking as Germans, we checked this prediction a number of times.)

Third, our analysis offers a few unexpected insights. One is that Denmark is projected to do well in this tournament, winning its group and losing only to Portugal in the quarterfinals. Although France—as world champion—has a high Elo score, Les Bleus are penalised in our model by a difficult group stage, lack of home advantage and negative momentum in recent games.

We see the intuition for our predictions in Exhibit 8, which decomposes the winning probability for selected teams. We see that Belgium’s high ELO score is the main component in the expected winning probability. But we also see that the “Home Advantage” favours countries in unexpected ways: while England clearly benefits from hosting both the semi-finals and the final in London, Belgium has an easier path to victory because other countries’ home advantages help eliminate stronger competitors.

Two analysts Christian Schnittker and Sven Jari Stehn led the analysis going through the prediction a number of times. The model was based on strength of the squad and goals scored in recent matches while also considering the factor of a “tournament effect”.

“We predict that Germany will make it out of its difficult group ahead of France, but then lose to England at Wembley during the round of 16. Speaking as Germans, we checked this prediction a number of times,” Goldman Sachs said in a note.

Euro 2020 predictions: As per the “tournament effect”, some countries outperform other teams considering low ELO ratings. For example, Germany, currently below France in ELO ratings, pipped the Frenchmen to qualify for the knockouts. The home advantage also played a major role in the prediction with the model giving a 0.4 goal advantage to the host. The model also hands Belgium an advantage due to its high ELO score. Belgium is the highest-rated team in Europe behind table topper Brazil.

“Our framework predicts that Belgium will win the Euros for the first time in history, narrowly beating Italy on July 11,” the Goldman Sachs analysts said.

Euro 2020 predictions: However, such models should be taken with a pinch of salt as a number of things could change during the tournament and predictions could go wrong. For example, an important player might get injured or individual errors lead to a surprise result. For example, Kevin De Bruyne, Belgium’s star player is doubtful for Euro 2020 after suffering a facial injury in the UEFA Champions League Final match for Manchester City.

“It is difficult to assess how much faith one should have in these predictions even with sophisticated statistical techniques,” the analysts said.

As for tough Group F, considered the group of death, Goldman Sachs predicts that world champion France will bow out from the group stage with Germany and Portugal making it to the Round of 16.

*Read the full text and complete document about EURO 2020 PREDICTIONS by Goldman Sachs HERE!

"It is difficult to assess how much faith one should have in these predictions. We capture

the stochastic nature of the tournament carefully using state-of-the-art statistical

methods and we consider a lot of information in doing so. That said, we also see that

the forecasts remain highly uncertain, even with the fanciest statistical techniques,

simply because football is quite an unpredictable game. This is, of course, precisely why

football is so exciting to watch" - Christian Schnittker and Sven Jari Stehn (Goldman Sachs)
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