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arXiv · 2110.00001

The Relative Importance of Ability, Luck and Motivation in Team Sports: a Bayesian Model of Performance in the English Rugby Premiership

Federico Fioravanti·Fernando Delbianco·Fernando Tohmé
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Abstract

Results in contact sports like Rugby are mainly interpreted in terms of the ability and/or luck of teams. But this neglects the important role of the {\em motivation} of players, reflected in the effort exerted in the game. Here we present a Bayesian hierarchical model to infer the main features that explain score differences in rugby matches of the English Premiership Rugby 2020/2021 season. The main result is that, indeed, {\em effort} (seen as a ratio between the number of tries and the scoring kick attempts) is highly relevant to explain outcomes in those matches.

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Federico Fioravanti, Fernando Delbianco, Fernando Tohmé. 2021-09-27. The Relative Importance of Ability, Luck and Motivation in Team Sports: a Bayesian Model of Performance in the English Rugby Premiership. https://arxiv.org/abs/2110.00001

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