Moneyball says Team England are favourites for the Home Nations

Let's take a look at the form guide across the Bowl and the Open

The third edition of the Home Nations is nearly upon us as three-hundred and twenty coaches from the four corners of Britain and Ireland and ten other nations from across Europe are set to descend on Loughborough to duke it out for the honour of winning the title of Home Nations.

Being favourite was no guarantee in Home Nations I and II

The last two editions of the tournament have thrown up some close results, which saw the favourites, Team England, come up short, by the thinnest of margins on both occasions. In the first edition the Barbarians, captained by the infamous Purplechest, squeezed out England in the Bowl by a single coach point on tiebreak.

The Barbarians, winners of The Home Nations Bowl on tiebreak by a single coach point - the closest of margins! L:R Hankok, Sann0638, JLeav, AndyDavo, Purplechest (Cpt.), Malmir, Candlejack, RickWreckless and BB_Jock, Home Nations TO.

Last year in the Bowl England were pipped to the post by the Italians who won the title by the tiebreak of winning their head-to-head clash with England in what surely would have been disappointing to the much fancied Team England.

Team Italy - Champions of the Home Nations Bowl II, edging out Team England on tiebreak after beating them in their head-to-head encounter. Can they repeat the feat this year as they seek to defend the title?

Whilst over in the Open Team England, as defending champs from the first Home Nations, were put to the sword in the most brutal fashion by eventual winners Tactics and Theatrics where they beat England 4-0 without conceding a single touchdown! (Ed: No surprise that this year some of T&T will be donning the England shirt instead of their black and white strip!)

For the third edition Team Italy are back to defend their title with gusto and won’t roll over for England - especially after T&T went over to Bergamo in May to successfully defend their Tilean Team Cup title. You could say best of three as the rivalry intensifies!

Look, over there! Coming over the hill, The Barbarians, captained by Purplechest, are back with a mischievous grin, looking to throw some chaos into the mix. 

And of course we shouldn’t forget Wales who are coming off the high of achieving runner-up to France at last year’s Eurobowl in Budapest who will be looking to muscle their way in on the title. They’re sporting streaming legends RickWreckless and AndyDavo - both it should be noted were on the winning Barbarian squad at Home Nations I.

So if you hold stock in coach Elo the form guide points to England, again, but Blood Bowl, and Nuffle, have a funny habit of making fools of us all!

Thanks to Stewbacca for a clever tool that compiles an Elo based form guide

Blood Bowl nerds love their stats, and a coach’s Elo is arguably the fulcrum that the NAF’s world of stats revolves around. It’s Blood Bowl’s Moneyball that lets us gaze into the crystal ball to predict who will triumph before the dice are rolled.

Thanks must go to Stewbacca, TO of Kent Team Championships, (20-21 February next year in Canterbury) who has created a nifty template and a handy YT explainer video that enables a TO to look up coaches’ Elo and predict who are the likely winners before the dice are rolled. 

England, on Elo, are strong favourites for both the Bowl and the Open.

Below we take a look at the average coach Elo per squad for the Bowl and the Open:

Home Nations Bowl: Squads seeded by average highest race Elo with Team England as favourites

The Bowl

From the stats you can see that both England and Italy with a coach Elo of 244 and 233 respectively have a comfortable gap back to Wales and the Barbarians in what could be thought of as the ‘second tier’. Whilst Scotland and Ireland look like they’ll be doing their best to avoid the Wooden Spoon!

So England should win right? Well maybe, the reality is that when you have coaches north of 220 in a match together results are determined by the slimmest of margins - didn’t get a key armour break, placed your player on the wrong square by one, can turn individual games on their head, and in turn the outcome of the round. One thing’s guaranteed in the Bowl - the Blood Bowl will be spicy!

The Open

With sixty-eight teams and four-coach squads it’s hard to look at Coach Elo and say this team will win for definite. Again like the Bowl, England sit comfortably atop the Average Coach Elo chart for this year’s edition. 

The Home Nations Open III - Squads seeded by the squad's average Elo across their best races in Blood Bowl. Will Team England deliver according to the form book?

However Geordie Old Boyz, (some of the team were runners-up last year in Morg ‘n’ Balds) Team Scotland, Wales, Cornwall (Ed: aspiring nation, if only they could claim independence and settle the whole jam before cream debate) and Hakflem Nibblers round out a mouth-watering top six. 

That’s before we even get to the defending champions Tactics and Theatrics in seventh, albeit with a changed coach line-up with some of last year’s team now playing for England in the Bowl. Realistically it wouldn’t be a surprise to see any of the top twelve as likely winners of the Open, and even further down the field there will be squads that fancy taking a big scalp and altering the course of the tournament hopefully in their favour.

Are you bold enough to make a prediction?

I’m not sure I would want to put my neck publicly on the chopping block for making bold predictions of who will walk away with the titles in the Bowl and the Open. However I’m pretty confident, whatever the outcome, it’s going to be an awesome weekend of Blood Bowl and revelry regardless of who wins.

Have you got a bold prediction of who you think will win? Leave a note in the comments below!

Next time we’ll look at the race composition the coaches are bringing to The Home Nations.

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