The Report-a-Score.com Soccer Team Rankings System
We've Got Soccer Rankings!
General Soccer Team Rankings Background
While many believe rankings of any kind in youth sports should be banned, the fact is they are used every day by parents, teams, clubs, tournaments, and player scouts as a guide in many important decisions they make. Especially in a world as enormous as youth and high school soccer in America, the need to compare and evaluate the "levels" of different teams across leagues and state borders is a reality that cannot be ignored.
We don't like the idea very much either, but rather than complain about the lack of fairness or transparency of other youth soccer rankings systems on the market today, we decided to use our soccer scores database within Report-a-Score.com to implement a new version of what we think is the fairest available soccer rankings system - one based on the same system used to rank international teams.
No ranking system is perfect. (Just ask a college football fan about the BCS system) However, as long as the system is based on sound math, is transparent, and gives every team the opportunity to be counted, we believe a system can at least be fair. We’re not stubborn either. Over time, it is possible this formula will be adjusted. If it is, we will clean out the entire history an start ranking from day one using the new formula.
In the end, no matter how close to perfect any rankings process is, it will only be as good as the amount of data collected. And it is here that we feel Report-a-Score's capability of using the entire soccer community itself in the collection of match reports will be just as compelling a piece to the rankings puzzle as a fairer formula.
But we need your help to get there. Report-a-Score is a very new website, and we need the community to jump on board with reporting of accurate scores in order for the rankings system to be fair for all. It is, and always will be, completely free to sign up for report-a-score, and we’ll never share your information with others. So, if you care about rankings, or at least care that a team you're associated with is fairly represented, we hope you'll get their scores in today and/or help keep an eye on the accuracy of information entered by others. To help, each team and division can be “followed” by members, which will alert you by email whenever a new results if reported by someone. Please join us.
Report-a-Score Soccer Rankings Details
What Counts Towards the Rankings?
Any official match entered in our system that is scheduled by a legitimate league or tournament that takes place within North America. In other words, anything but a scrimmage.
Win, Tie, or Loss
The first factor in the formula assigns a base points value to each team that wins or ties a match. Teams receive three (3) points for a win, two (2) points for "winning" a tied match on Penalty Kicks, and one (1) point for a tie or a tied match "lost" on Penalty Kicks. Zero (0) points are awarded for a loss.
Type of Match
Different types of matches carry greater importance than others, but all "real" matches need to be included in order to provide the most accurate ranking. Our formula accounts for this, with the most important "Finals" matches receiving three times the points value of the most basic - yet still valued - "Non-League/Friendly" match types. Report-a-Score allows reporting of eight (8) different match "types", seven (7) of which assign a value that acts as a weighting multiplier to the points awarded for a win or tie:
- Non-League/Friendly - 1.0
- Tournament Group Play - 2.0
- League Play - 2.5
- Tournament Playoff - 2.75
- League Playoff - 2.75
- Tournament Final - 3.0
- League Final - 3.0
Strength of Opponent
It should go without saying that a team should earn more points for defeating or tying a high quality opponent, regardless of said team's own quality. Rather than use an older method of awarding more or fewer points based on comparing the difference in rankings position between opposing teams, our formula assigns each team with a "Competitive Strength" each time a new ranking is "run". This is based on each teams' ranking position relative to all ranked teams in its age category, but not taking into account the ranking of the opponent. This way, your team receives the same points value for beating the 10th place team in the country regardless of your own team's rank. Your team could be ranked 1st or 300th, and a win against the 10th ranked team would still award the same number of points.
To establish Competitive Strength, each team is assigned a multiple of between 0.5 and 2.0 based on the formula [teams in ranking - ranking position] / [teams in ranking / 2]. The formula returns a value between 0 and 2.0, but for our rankings system, no team is assigned a value of below 0.50. This values all teams in the bottom 25% of any rankings the same. Conversely, only the team at the top of the ranking will be assigned a value of 2.0. All told, this factor can provide up to 4-times the number of points for beating the #1 ranked team over beating a team in the bottom 25% of the entire ranking system
Example 1: In a ranking of 2000 teams, the team that is 300th in the ranking:
(2000-300) / 1000 = 1.7 | the team is assigned a weighting of 1.7
Example 2: In a ranking of 2000 teams, the team that is 850th in the ranking:
(2000-850) / 1000 = 1.15 | the team is assigned the weighting of 1.15
Example 3: In a ranking of 2000 teams, the team that is 1650th in the ranking:
(2000-1650) / 1000 = 0.35 | the team is assigned the weighting of 0.50
Regional Strength
Acknowledging that certain regions of the country have stronger average team strengths is an essential element of the formula, as most teams play a large majority of their matches within their own region. However, as the Report-a-Score ranking system is still brand new, initial rankings will not takes this factor into account until a statistically significant number of matches are represented within every state. At that point in the future, the formula will assign a regional weighting to teams to help balance out points accumulated by stronger teams playing in a weaker region, while teams that may be significantly stronger might struggle for wins or ties in a more competitive region.
Age of Matches
Especially in youth soccer, teams can see major changes in quality over short periods of time. Therefore, only matches played during the last two years (24 months) are taken into account in the ranking, with more recent matches having the greatest influence. Results during the last 12 months count in full, while results from the previous year count only half. In our formula, these values simply multiply the entire number of points earned by either 1.0 or 0.50.
This factor is the reason a team's ranking may go up or down from one ranking period to the next, even if no games had been played.
Team Age Difference
For all age groups we rank from under-12 through under-23, we have included a factor to account for the scenarios when teams from different age groups play each other. The formula rewards a team for a result against an older team, or reduces the reward for a result against a younger team. Each age difference is worth 10% added, or subtracted from the base points award if the opponent had been the same page. The percentage does not compound.
Example 1: An under-15 teams defeats an under-14 team in a tournament. The total rankings points awarded the under-15 team are multiplied by 0.9.
Example 2: An under-16 team defeats an under-18 team in a "high school" division of a local league. The total rankings points awarded the under-16 team are multiplied by 1.2.
Example 3: An under-17 team ties an under-16 team in a tournament. The under-17 team's total rankings points are multiplied by 0.9, while the under-16 team's total rankings points are multiplied by 1.1.
Goals
The number of goals scored, or difference between goals conceded and goals scored for any one match are not included as a factor in these rankings.
Multiplication Factor
After rankings points for each match are calculated using all of the above, we then multiply the entire formula by 100 to ensure rankings points are always whole numbers.
The Formula
Putting all of this together, we get a simple formula used to award points to the winner of each match, or to both teams in a match in the event of a draw. With the new total for all matches played, teams are then re-ranked based on their total points.
Match Points = [Points from Win, PK win, PK loss, or Tie] x [Opponent Strength] x [Match Type] x [Match Age] x [Regional Strength (always 1.0 for now)] x [Team Age Difference] x 100
Service
Just as important as a great formula, we also believe responsiveness and error corrections are key if the community is to have trust in the results. If you find an error in a match result, just use the provided tools to report it, and we’ll get it fixed. Got a question? Send us an email at feedback@hummersport.com or call 703-433-1887.