In the World Cup, the chances of success for each team depend on the characteristics of the team and also depend on the rivals in the way to the achieve the Cup.
Assuming that two teams like England and Italy, had the same theoretical chance of being champion.
The real possibility depends on the rivals will be presented for each one.
It is very different having to play against Uruguay, Denmark and France to reach the final, which have to play against Argentina, Holland and Germany.
In the latter case the real possibilities of reaching the final would be reduced in comparison with the first case.
For example in the World Cup Mexico 86, while Argentina had to Diego Armando Maradona, the highest star, it is recalled that Argentina had its share of luck to reach the final, having to play against rivals like Uruguay and Belgium, and avoiding face strong teams like Brazil, France, the Soviet Union itself.
By contrast France than in world that was a favorite to take the Cup with Platini as his star, faced in the second round to Italy in the quarterfinals to Brazil in the semifinals to Germany.
Obviously these challenges were much harder than Argentina.
Argentina was the one who ultimately came to the end and not France, although the most soccer experts gave greater credit to France.
These possibilities of reaching the final could have known beforehand? For if, as the competitors were possible to predict and understand the real possibility that Argentina was higher than in France even if the latter had greater power football.
Now, we are looking about South Africa World Cup 2010.
How can we predict the possibilities for each team country? The answer can be divided in 2 parts: the first, is to achieve a group of statistical properties for each team.
The second is to simulate the result games using these statistical properties and mathematical statistical models.