Game Theory: How Luck and Analytics Shape Football

What if what we think about football isn't true: that despite all the efforts of coaches, managers, and players to control chance, it's not uncommon for the wrong teams to be at the top of the table and not the right ones to be relegated?

What if we praise the wrong teams instead of criticizing the right ones? What if Real Madrid had won the Champions League a few too many times and Pep Guardiola a few too few? What if, after a Premier League match, we come up with great theories about 'bogey teams' or about 'the run' a team is currently on because we don't want to admit how random many results really are? And what consequences would that have?

Christoph Biermann has embarked on a search for chance and spoken with coaches, managers, club owners, and mathematicians all over the globe. He has discovered some astonishing things that will change our view of football and how we talk about the magic of the game. This is a deep-dive into theelement of chance in football - the fine margins and the small yet significant moments that completely alter the course of a match and our perceptions of an overall performance.

• Publication date: 13 August 2026
• Page count: 304
• Dimensions: Height 232 mm; Width 153 mm; Thickness 25 mm
• Publisher: Bonnier Books Ltd
• Format: Paperback
• ISBN-13: 9781806172689